Youth justice in Australia 2017–18

Publication

Release Date: 10 May 2019

Topic: Youth justice

Media release

AIHW

Australian Institute of Health and Welfare 2019. Youth justice in Australia 2017–18. Cat. no. JUV 129. Canberra: AIHW.

APA

Australian Institute of Health and Welfare. (2019). Youth justice in Australia 2017–18. Canberra: AIHW.

MLA

Australian Institute of Health and Welfare. Youth justice in Australia 2017–18. AIHW, 2019.

Vancouver

Australian Institute of Health and Welfare. Youth justice in Australia 2017–18. Canberra: AIHW; 2019.

Harvard

Australian Institute of Health and Welfare 2019, Youth justice in Australia 2017–18, AIHW, Canberra.

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Of the 5,513 young people under youth justice supervision on an average day in 2017–18, most were male (81%) and supervised in the community (83%). Overall rates of supervision varied among the states and territories, from 12 per 10,000 in Victoria to 59 per 10,000 in the Northern Territory. Supervision fell over the 5 years from 2013–14 to 2017–18 for community-based supervision, but rose for detention. Indigenous over-representation also continued to rise.

ISBN: 978-1-76054-515-4 (PDF) 978-1-76054-516-1 (Print)
Cat. no: JUV 129
Pages: 49

Findings from this report:

60% of young people in detention were unsentenced—that is, awaiting the outcome of their legal matter or sentencing
On an average day in 2017–18, 5,513 young people aged 10 and over were under youth justice supervision
Of young people under supervision on an average day, 83% were supervised in the community and 18% were in detention
Individual periods of supervision that were completed during 2017–18 lasted for a median of 119 days (about 4 months)

1 Introduction

The youth justice system
Youth justice supervision
Key policy directions in 2017–18
This report

2 Numbers and rates of young people under supervision

National
States and territories

3 Characteristics of young people under supervision

Age and sex
Indigenous young people under supervision
Remoteness area
Socioeconomic position

4 Community-based supervision

Unsentenced community-based supervision
Sentenced community-based supervision

5 Detention

Unsentenced detention
Sentenced detention
Detention entries and exits

6 Time under supervision

Orders and supervision periods
Length of supervision periods
Total time under supervision

7 Supervision history

First entry to supervision
Youth justice supervision history

8 Trends in supervision

Recent trends
Longer trends

9 Youth justice in context

The youth and adult justice systems in Australia
Australian and international approaches to youth justice

Acknowledgments
Abbreviations
Symbols
Glossary
References
List of tables
List of figures
Related publications

Appendix 1: Data quality and technical notes

Appendix 2: Youth justice remand and detention centres

Appendix 3: Youth justice legislation

Appendix 4: State and territory youth justice systems, policies and programs 2017–18

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