Being seventeen in Queensland: A human rights perspective on sentencing in Queensland

Abstract

The Queensland criminal justice system has come under the international spotlight in relation to its policy on the treatment of 17 years old offenders. In Queensland, if you are a young offender, you are treated as an adult at 17. Queensland is now the only state in Australia where this occurs. The United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child in its latest Observations has voiced specific concerns in relation to this aberration. In its Concluding Observations on the latest Australian report, the Committee recommended that all 'necessary measures' be taken 'to ensure that persons under 18 who are in conflict with the law are only deprived of liberty as a last resort and detained separately from adults unless it is considered in the child's best interest not to do so' and specifically that in Queensland 'children who are 17 years old' are removed from 'the adult justice system'. Queensland is totally 'out of step' with national and international standards, and yes, it does matter.