Koch, Terina --- "Curfews: Aboriginal Legal Service of Western Australia" [2003] IndigLawB 54; (2003) 5(27) Indigenous Law Bulletin 7
Curfews: Aboriginal Legal Service of Western Australia
by Terina Koch
In 1993 the United Nations General Assembly designated 1994 –2003 as the Third Decade to Combat Racism and Racial Discrimination. Someone forget to tell Dr Geoff Gallop, Labor Premier of Western Australia.
As we speed towards the end of this special decade, the Gallop Government introduced the Northbridge curfew which bans unsupervised youth up to the age of 18 years from the inner city entertainment area where they are ‘misbehaving’. Those under 18 years, if deemed to be ‘at risk’ of physical or moral danger, are subject to removal from a public
space to police detention at the offices of the Juvenile Aid Group until an appropriate adult collects them.
On its face, the curfew seeks to address the desire by local traders to attract more patrons to their establishments and put an end to the unpleasantness some feel when venturing into the designated area. In other words, the curfew seeks to clean up the streets. However, research by Mission Australia identifies 70 percent of crime in the curfew area as being perpetrated by adults not juveniles.[1] Further, there has been no unmanageable upsurge of crime by young people in Northbridge. On the contrary, in the 12 months prior to the commencement of the curfew youth incidents resulting in arrest decreased.
However, it assists the Government’s agenda as champion of the law and order debate to target young Aborigines, the most vulnerable and marginalised in the community.
From the curfew’s inception on 23 June 2003 to 14 September 2003, 285 Aboriginal youth have been removed from the streets of Northbridge while only 39 non-Indigenous youth have been detained. The statistics clearly demonstrate the overwhelming impact of the curfew upon Aboriginal youth which we contend places them at the intersections of age and race discrimination.
Aboriginal youth do not go unnoticed. Due to systemic racism in our society, they cannot walk in groups without being targeted as gangs. They cannot wander through stores without being diligently watched by staff as potential shoplifters. They cannot travel on public transport without being viewed with fear by other commuters. They cannot raise their voice in the joyful exuberance of youth without being seen as disturbing the peace or being a nuisance. At best, the recording of the cultural background of those apprehended pursuant to the curfew policy serves no valuable purpose other than to focus on difference, which by its very essence encourages a racist undercurrent.
Criminal activity by Aboriginal youth in Northbridge demands an unbiased interpretation. Some Aboriginal children left traumatised and bitter by their troubled life experiences will resort to anti-social behaviour, be it in the Northbridge area or elsewhere. After all, resilience like all things has its limits. Not surprisingly, young Aborigines are attracted to the bright city lights. Others frequent the area as the products of poverty, homelessness, transience and family disintegration. It is a travesty that the curfew’s guiding principal is the arrest of our youth due to their perceived physical or moral vulnerability. Caring for their vulnerability is a role for welfare and health services, and should not have a punitive character.
The curfew persists in spite of Article 37 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, which demands that no child shall be deprived of their liberty subjectively and detention shall be used only as a measure of last resort and for the shortest appropriate period of time. The Gallop Government has chosen to ignore the UN Convention ratified by the Federal Government in 1990. The process of forced removal of young Aborigines from Northbridge introduces them to the juvenile justice system. It is a process where they are arrested by police for being in a public place, confined in police vans, undergo body searches, and are detained until an ‘appropriate’ adult is summoned for hand over. In some circumstances, this hand over of the young person without their ability to raise objections may compromise their safety.
Client complaints to the Aboriginal Legal Service have shown the curfew to have impacted well outside its parameters. Two days following the commencement of the curfew, the West Australian newspaper published a photograph of two very young Aboriginal boys having been ‘caught’ in the curfew by police. Accompanying the photograph was a bold headline proclaiming ‘Curfew success claimed’, discussing incidents of unsupervised children being removed from the streets of Northbridge. However, the photograph was a complete misrepresentation as the boys had merely asked the police to escort them back to their grandmother who needed information from the police.
In another incident a group of young Aboriginal girls between 15 and 16 years were detained by police under the curfew and removed to the Juvenile Aid Group (‘JAG’) for processing even though they were not within the curfew zone. The experience was very traumatic for the young girls who were seized by police at the Perth Railway station as they were attempting to return home from an outing to the movies.
The curfew extends the existing police powers under the Child Welfare Act in that young persons are processed by police and held in JAG offices rather than returned to their place of residence. Such action fails to address the needs of the young detainees. Instead, it serves to alienate them from the mainstream community, both in terms of their physical relocation and emotional retardation.
Of further concern is the silence surrounding the nature and extent of the records maintained following detention. Moreover, whether such information can be accessed, and by whom, in any future judicial/quasi judicial forums.
In sum, the distorted focus of the curfew policy has the potential to negatively impact Aboriginal youth and their families well beyond the hours the young person may spend in custody. The cycle of despair suffered by Aboriginal youth patronising the Northbridge vicinity demands dismantling. There must be a supportive approach to Aboriginal youth instead of the present punitive policy which serves to further exploit their disadvantage.
Terina Koch is a Human Rights Lawyer with the Aboriginal Legal Service of Western Australia.
[1] Mission Australia “More to Northbridge problems than youth” Media Release 8/1/02