November 2007
How JT saw it
There is a growing international apprehension about your law and order issues in the Northern Territory.
The Northern Territory Government has distorted and overblown a fear of crime in order to promote a law and order campaign. They consistently misuse and misquote statistics. They even suggest the “measures enacted including mandatory minimum sentences were key issues in our most recent election where the Government was returned with an increased majority.” They even suggest this is “Democracy at work!” eat your heart out deTocqueville and Michels, with democracy theorists of this NT calibre around you’d have no chance.
They evidence ” that figures just released indicate that property crime is down 14% over the past three years.” They of course fail to note that sausage meat sales in Uruguay went up by a corresponding amount.” The next thing they’ll be questioning is the assertion that most people have more than the average number of legs.
They assert that young people dying in custody is an unconnected issue to mandatory sentencing. They say “A quite separate issue, that of youth suicide, is a very serious and tragic situation across the country. No-one seems to have the answers yet but one thing the experts agree on is that publicity almost always produces a copy cat tragic result.”
Father forgive them they don’t read and won’t listen. Even the most uncaring has heard of the 12 Volume “Aboriginal Deaths in Custody Report” and the “Bringing them Home Report”. These reports explain the connection between imprisonment, being an indigenous person and being suicided by the corrections system.
As a cover for their wilful racism and ignorance they assert those who decry deliberate state killing of young people are opponents of democracy in the Northern Territory.
They assert “It is an obscenity that politically motivated opponents of democracy in the NT would cynically exploit this most unfortunate situation.”
So blinded by their own stupidity and ideological ranting they fail to see the inadequacies and contradictions in their analysis. They start by telling us that mandatory sentencing has brought down property crime, elsewhere their leader who recently asserted the “entire judiciary was corrupt” claimed that “punishment was an essential part of the mandatory sentencing process.”
They assert “It should also be noted that the Don Dale Detention Centre is more like a boarding school with a fence than the TV impression given by American movies. The Don Dale Centre is well equipped with a swimming pool, other sporting and recreational facilities and schooling five days a week.”
One would hope given the established connection between failing to progress at school and being caught up in the criminal justice process that education would be an essential feature of any corrective facility. The allusion to swimming pools and other sporting facilities is, I presume, designed to make us think that Don Dale is a cross between a Billy Bunter holiday camp and a home away from home where the screws tuck each child in bed of an evening.”
On the contrary it is a detention centre where young people are transported hundreds of kilometres from their home to be suicided
This CLP Government has used the racist card in every election since self- government, it relies on the fact that the Indigenous community is only about 27% of the population and the bulk of whites turn over every three years. I lived there for 15 years, I’ve visited their jails and detention centres, I played an important part in having one closed because it was worse than the adult jails in several regards. I regularly return and I keep in touch with developments.
How the Country Liberal party sees it
CHRIS LUGG MLA wrote
Dear Sir/Madam
There is obviously a serious misapprehension about our law and order issues in the Northern Territory. Please find attached a brief explanation of the facts.
The Northern Territory Government has responded to public pressure to act. The measures enacted including mandatory minimum sentences were key issues in our most recent election where the Government was returned with an increased majority. Democracy at work! It is interesting to note that figures just
released indicate that property crime is down 14% over the past three years.
A quite separate issue, that of youth suicide, is a very serious and tragic situation across the country. No-one seems to have the answers yet but one thing the experts agree on is that publicity almost always produces a copy cat tragic result. It is an obscenity that politically motivated opponents of democracy in the NT would cynically exploit this most unfortunate situation.
It should also be noted that the Don Dale Detention Centre is more like a boarding school with a fence than the TV impression given by American movies. The Don Dale Centre is well equipped with a swimming pool, other sporting and recreational facilities and schooling five days a week.
I invite you to consider the above and the attached facts and weigh up the issue fairly and objectively.
Yours sincerely
CHRIS LUGG MLA Mandatory Sentencing Juveniles
· Juveniles are young people aged 15 and 16.
· Mandatory sentencing only applies to juveniles who commit property offences.
· Property offences include unlawfully going into other people’s property and stealing other people’s possessions.
· Offences committed at age 14 or younger, do not count for the purposes of mandatory sentencing.
· In most cases, when a juvenile commits a minor property offence for the first time, the Police caution the offender and tell him or her not to do
it again. They do not go to court.
· When a juvenile appears before a court for the first time for a property offence, and is found guilty, the court is not required to send the offender to a detention centre. The court has a range of sentences available. These include sending the juvenile away without recording a penalty, requiring the juvenile to behave himself for a period of time, or making the juvenile pay a fine or work in the community.
· When a juvenile appears before a court for a property offence for the second time, and is found guilty, the court may require the juvenile to participate in a diversionary program as an alternative to spending time in a detention centre.
· If a juvenile satisfactorily completes a diversionary program, the court may discharge the juvenile without a penalty.
· There are many types of diversionary programs and they include training, employment and sports programs. They also include meetings where the juvenile meets the victim, listens to the damage that he or she has caused and decides how to make amends to the victim.
· If the juvenile does not want to participate in a diversionary program, or if the court thinks that the juvenile is unsuitable, or if the juvenile fails to satisfactorily complete the program, the court must order the juvenile to spend 28 days in a detention centre.
· When a juvenile appears before a court for a property offence for the third time or more, and is found guilty, the court must order the juvenile to
spend 28 days in a detention centre.
· An offender may be found guilty of one or more property offences on the same day, but the court is only required to impose one sentence of 28 days.
· The court may decide to sentence the offender for more than the mandatory minimum period.
Adults
· Adults are people aged 17 or over
· Mandatory sentencing only applies to adults who commit property offences, sexual or violent offences.
· Offences committed as a juvenile do not count for the purposes of mandatory sentencing.
· When an adult appears before a court for the first time for a property offence, and is found guilty, the court is not required to send the offender to prison if the offender can prove there were exceptional circumstances surrounding the offence and it was trivial. The offender must also have made an effort to make full restitution and have cooperated with the Police
Copyright © 2025 John Tomlinson