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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2004 Week 09 Hansard (Tuesday, 17 August 2004) . . Page.. 3675 ..

We talk about the responsibility of the Territory as Parent. The responsibility of the Territory as Parent must continue while these young people are in Quamby. We cannot walk away from our parental responsibilities just because somebody is incarcerated in the juvenile justice detention system. It is at that point that parental responsibility becomes incredibly important for the provision of ongoing support to the young person during their rehabilitation.

The committee questioned how we can provide guidance or adult support for these young people. There has been a lot of research into mentoring programs which can provide a very positive support mechanism for these young people. I hope the government picks up on the recommendations where we call for transition support for young people so that the support work in Quamby is able to be continued when they leave. We also recommend that a mentoring scheme be established for young people who are either on remand or have been committed to Quamby.

One of the other issues I would like to draw the Assembly’s attention to relates to how we support young people when they have finished their time at Quamby and are moved back into the community. Unless there are ongoing court orders, contact with the young person often just disappears and they do not get any ongoing support—possibly up until the time they re-offend and end up back in the juvenile justice system. If we are going to try and break that cycle and support young people in the community, we need to look at ways in which we can facilitate a young person receiving ongoing contact and ongoing support once they finish their term.

We note that there are no clear mechanisms for providing young people with guaranteed ongoing support if they are not on further court orders. That places a great demand on the community sector, and young people often fall through the cracks. I urge the government to seriously consider the recommendations we make there to ensure ongoing support for these young people so they do not re-offend because they see that as the only way to access help.

We also looked at how we can measure success. We often hear the sad stories that come out of Quamby, where things have gone wrong and young people have gone off the rails. We also need to look at how the programs we are implementing are supporting young people, how they are turning young people’s lives around, and how we can promote the successes of the work being done.

The Office of the Community Advocate has been undertaking research into young people’s experiences of exit planning and post-release support. We recommend to the government that, when that work is completed, they look over what the Office of the Community Advocate has done, look over this report and work with stakeholders in order that performance measures can be established. That will allow us to focus our resources into areas that most need them.

In conclusion, I turn members’ attention to the snapshot of the young people who are incarcerated at Quamby that is provided in this report. The vast majority of young people in Quamby have complex needs. The lives of many are characterised by a history of abuse, drug and/or alcohol addiction, poverty, family breakdown, homelessness, discrimination and alienation.

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