“I don’t know if you’ve ever seen your brothers and sisters in one room together, hungry … but it’s a bad, bad feeling.”
“I was removed at 4.”
“I started getting into crime to make money and support my family. If we stole a car, it was to sell it – it wasn’t for nothing, it was to feed your family.”
“The reality is, no one is going to look at a little Black kid twice for a job.”
These are some of the stories that kids shared for the Australian Human Rights Commission’s report - How Australia can transform child justice to improve safety and wellbeing.
The report by National Children’s Commissioner Anne Hollonds makes 24 recommendations, including raising the age of criminal responsibility to 14 across all states and territories, banning solitary confinement and consistently monitoring all child detention facilities.
Authorities across the nation are approaching youth justice the wrong way, Commissioner Hollonds said.
"We put a lot of attention and resources into the justice system with more policing, building more children's prisons, locking up more children," she told AAP.
"We've been getting tougher and tougher and spending all that money at the justice end.
"It's not helping."
On an average day there are 4542 children under youth justice supervision across the nation.
More than half (57 per cent) of those kids are Indigenous.
Catherine Liddle, chief executive at SNAICC – National Voice for Our Children, told NITV that the report's title, 'Help Way Earlier!' says it all.
"Because what we know is that if we don't invest in things like family support, if we don't invest in early intervention and prevention programs, if we're not investing in things like a universal childcare system and community led intervention programs, we are going to continue to be having the same conversation," she said.
"Why are the number of children hitting our detention centres increasing?
"Why aren't we looking at where the real problems are and the problems are downstream, particularly for First Nations children."
Recent developments have contradicted the call for a more compassionate approach to youths in the justice system.
Two weeks ago Victoria backflipped on raising the age of criminal responsibility to 14 - one of the recommendations in the Human Rights Commission's report - sparking dismay from First Nations and children's organisations.
Just over a year ago, the Northern Territory raised the age of criminal responsibility from 10 to 12, but Country Liberal Party leader Lia Finocchiaro has vowed to lower it again should they win this weekend's election.
In Queensland, which also has an election looming, the Liberal National Party has been campaigning on tougher punishment for children, including sentencing kids as adults for some offences.
"It is also really abundantly clear that every time you might get some traction in something that starts working with children and working with families and reinforcing those structures, we're hit by election cycles that undo everything as politicians race to the bottom," Ms Liddle said.
"Nearly every election cycle, all of a sudden politicians want to start locking up more children and lowering the age of criminal responsibility instead of investing in the solutions that keep victims safe, that keep communities safe, and mean that we have radically reduced the amount of children coming into the detention system."
Children who have contact with the justice system have often faced poverty, insecure housing, domestic and family violence, health and mental health issues, disabilities, systemic racism and intergenerational trauma, the commission found.
The report recommended investing in restorative justice diversionary programs, child-specialist courts, better training, improved data collection and investment in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander community controlled organisations.
A spokesperson for NT-based First Nations not-for-profit Children’s Ground said the organisation has presented solutions to government to tackle injustices faced by Indigenous children.
"We have had silence from government," they said.
"Instead, our children are punished and locked up.
"Governments must start listening and acting on expert advice. They must enter meaningful collaboration with First Nations communities to reform this crisis."
The commission also recommended the establishment of a national task force to lead justice reform across the nation, saying states and territories cannot do it alone.
Ms Liddle called on all governments to implement the recommendations as a matter of urgency.
"It is saying that we are treating vulnerable children in a way that is unacceptable," she said.
"We are treating vulnerable children with punishments, as opposed to investing in a system that genuinely creates safe communities."
