Smart Justice for Young People

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We acknowledge the Traditional Owners and Custodians of the lands on which we operate, the Wurundjeri Woi-Wurrung and Bunurong Peoples of the Kulin Nation. We extend this acknowledgement to all First Nations’ Peoples and pay our respects to their Elders past and present and acknowledge sovereignty was never ceded.

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Department of Justice and Community Safety (DJCS), Department of Health (DH), Department of Families, Fairness, Housing (DFFH), Office of Youth, Family Safety Victoria create local, community-based safety, 24/7 homelessness and mental health rapid response teams without police involvement at first instance. Teams to be trauma informed and trained in de-escalation. (See e.g. Youth Projects – Foot Patrol, New York City Be-Heard and Community Night Patrols) (1).

References:

  1. Refer to Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS), ‘A Framework to reduce criminalisation of young people in residential care’ (Report, January 2020) p 20; relates as well to Alternative Service Model discussions currently being held as part of the Raise the Age reform; Please note too Legislative Council Legal and Social Issues Committee, ‘Inquiry into Victoria’s Criminal Justice System’ (Melbourne, 21 September 2021) p 21, comments made by Sergeant Wayne Gatt in the context of mental health, “Effectively it is about getting upstream with mental health intervention. We agree with and support the royal commission’s findings into mental health reform that is required. But if you want to look at the police intervention and the freeing up of those resources, then it simply is trying to minimise those handover processes that exist in hospitals, enable police to quickly and expediently deliver people to places where they can receive care, but to invest and solidly invest in in-community and peer care in terms of mental health, to ensure that police are not the people being called to help people in a health crisis, but clinicians are being called—and I will say not to people in crisis but in-community care and support is provided to people with mental health conditions, to help them manage it before they are in crisis. The only reason police are called is because we have let it go too long or because the system has failed them and they are falling into crisis...”