Newsletters / Bulletins
18 November 2022
This week we cannot have avoided being made aware of the treatment of primary school aged child ‘prisoners’ in a Perth justice centre. This was a picture of trauma, disadvantage, distress and injustice. And it was not the first time. At the United Nations Human Rights Council Universal Period Review (a three year cycle of review) of Australia’s compliance with international human rights charters to which we are signatory, 29 of 47 countries made a recommendation relating to the age of criminal responsibility as demonstrated in the recommendation by the Republic of Maldova: “[That Australia] adjust the national child justice system in line with the Convention on the Rights of the Child, in particular raise the minimum age of criminal responsibility from 10 to 14 years of age”.