Page81 - Week 01 - Wednesday, 2 December 2020
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work that will need to be undertaken in relation to that. We will do that in the context of our commitment to be a restorative city and base our policies on evidence.
MR COE: Minister, which overseas jurisdictions does the ACT government see as the best practice models when it comes to providing successful alternatives to youth detention?
MS STEPHEN-SMITH: That is part of the work that will be done. I possibly should have handed over to the Attorney-General, who will have primary carriage for some of this work. But having had the opportunity myself to visit Scotland a couple of years ago and talk to them not just about the child protection system but also the youth justice system, I know that there are some very strong lessons to be learnt. We talked specifically about the implementation of functional family therapy in the youth justice space.
Other jurisdictions overseas have also done very good work in this space. We will be learning all the lessons we can from across the world around how you best support young people to divert them from access to the criminal justice system and ensure that they and their families are given the support that they need to get their lives back on track and not be engaged with the justice system as they age.
MS LEE: Minister, who have you consulted with so far in relation to this topic?
Mr RATTENBURY: I have responsibility for that part of the work. The ACT government is involved in what was the Council of Attorneys-General. That has been changed as a consequence of the Conran review. Nonetheless, the ACT is working with all other jurisdictions across Australia, the commonwealth and other states and territories, to look at this matter.
The Western Australian government is currently preparing a report on behalf of all jurisdictions. The most recent meeting of Attorneys-General has asked that Western Australia provide that report in March. We are working with those other jurisdictions to identify both the kinds of programs that Mr Coe’s questions are asking about, as well as other options. We will also work with a range of community stakeholders who have both views and policy ideas in this space.
The government have made a commitment to make this legislative change, but we are quite open in saying that we also have some work to do and we intend to work with a range of important stakeholders to make sure that we get this change right. We want to make this change; we do not believe that young people and children should be incarcerated. But we also need to make sure that where there is antisocial behaviour it is not consequence free and that we change the trajectory of that young person’s life to make sure that they understand that there are victims of these activities.
Disability—employment strategy
MS CASTLEY: My question is to the Assistant Minister for Families and Community Services. In the Labor-Greens parliamentary and governing agreement
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