Adjourned debate on second reading.
(Continued from 26 May. Page 750.)
The Hon. IAN GILFILLAN: In simple terms, the Democrats support
the Bill. This is an appropriate occasion to reinforce one of the underlying
principles that we work on, particularly in the area of young offenders.
There is often a serious risk of contamination of younger people, who may
have been quite recently involved in criminal offences, with an older prison
population. It is obvious that that type of contamination can quite often
cement a young person into a much longer periodóperhaps a lifetimeóof crime
and antisocial behaviour. It is therefore important to note that any amendments
and variations in where a young person is to spend a time of incarceration,
whether it is a training centre (a euphemism for a juvenile prison) or
an adult prison, is more than just an exercise in semantics: it is an area
which should be assessed with sensitivity to the particular social and
psychological circumstances of an individual. Those of us who can recollect
ourselves in our late teens will realise that the demarcation between 17
and 18 is not an immediate transition from being a young child to being
an adult with the supposed maturity of adulthood.
So, it is with that background that I view the Bill. As far as
I have been able to ascertain, under this amending Bill there seems to
be very little more risk than under the current legislation that a young
offender will be exposed to being detained in an adult prison or held on
remand in an adult prison, and one hopes that it would be less.
I will pick up one point in the proposed amendment to the Young
Offenders Act. Supposedly, the result is that if a youth in a training
centre is sentenced for an adult offence they must be moved to a prison.
From my reading of the text of the Bill it looks as though the court may
still exercise discretion. However, I am nervous that the court may not
exercise the option to allow that youth to continue on in the training
centre. If the Attorney does not mention that in his second reading summing
up, I would appreciate his concen-trating on it in Committee and explaining
what extra injunc-tion is provided by this amending clause removing what
I regard as a potentially useful option of allowing the young person to
be retained in the training centre rather than their mandatory transferral
to prison. I look forward with interest to the Committee stage, where I
expect that matters which I may have overlooked and which should be addressed
will come up and be dealt with, but we certainly indicate support for the
second reading.
The Hon. K.T. GRIFFIN (Attorney-General):I thank the Leader
of the Opposition and the Hon. Mr Gilfillan for their indications of support
for the Bill. I will deal with the issues raised by members and if there
are remaining questions we can clarify them during the Committee consideration
of the Bill, which I propose will be next Tuesday.
The Leader of the Opposition raises some questions which relate
to matters raised by the Youth Affairs Council, in particular on proposed
new sections 36A and 63A of the Young Offenders Act. Draft section 36A(1)
provides:
If a youth who is serving a sentence of detention or imprisonment
in a training centre (the `youth sentence') is sentenced to imprison-ment
for an offence committed after turning 18 years of age and that sentence
is to be served concurrently with the youth sentence, the Youth Court must,
unless the sentencing court directs otherwise, be transferred to, and will
serve those sentences in, a prison.
It has been suggested that this clause represents a change to the law
and provides for the automatic transfer of a youth to an adult prison.
This is in incorrect. Proposed section 36A is based on current section
36(2a), as omitted under the preceding clause of the Bill. The provision
is proposed to be moved as a matter of drafting, it being inappropriately
placed in a section relating to children sentenced as adults. A change
to the provision is to clarify that the period spent in prison counts for
the purposes of the concurrent sentence of detention.
The provision is considered to strike an appropriate balance.
Where a person is to be imprisoned for an offence committed after the person
has turned 18 years of age the presumption is that the custodial sentence
will be served in prison. Where a person is serving a sentence of detention
in a training centre for a youth offence, the section gives the court the
discretion to allow the adult sentence to be served in the training centre.
Whether or not that discretion is exercised would be a matter for the court
in all the circum-stances of the case and the individual concerned. Sec-tion
63A provides:
If a youth who is serving a sentence of detention or imprisonment
in a training centre (a `youth sentence') is remanded to a prison in relation
to an offence alleged to have been committed after turning 18 years of
age (an `adult offence'), the youth must be transferred to a prison and
will be taken to be serving the youth sentence during the period of remand.
It has been queried whether this involves unnecessary double handling
and whether it is appropriate for the youth to be transferred from the
training centre to prison for an alleged adult offence where the youth
will be returned to the training centre if not convicted.
It is again a matter of due process. Clause 9 of the Bill inserts
new sections 183 and 184 into the Summary Proced-ure Act. This provides
for the courts to be able to remand persons to a training centre where
they are charged with adult offences while subject to the juvenile justice
system. Where, in all the circumstances, the court considers it inappropriate
to remand the person to a training centre and the person is remanded to
prison, proposed section 63A will ensure that the period of remand counts
for the purposes of the serving of the juvenile sentence.
I should indicate also that I referred a copy of the Bill to
the Youth Affairs Council and my office has clarified the matters which
were raised by the Youth Affairs Council, I believe to its satisfaction.
The Hon. Carolyn Pickles also asked a question about how many persons have
fallen through the cracks. Well, if they have fallen through the cracks
we would not know about them. The difficulty is that, if they have fallen
through the cracks, there is no mechanism by which we are able to pick
up information about them.
I think that deals with the issues that members have raised but,
as I said at the commencement of this reply, if there are other issues
or if further clarification is required we can deal with that during the
Committee stage.
Bill read a second time.
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