Byrne said the Minns Labor government should to “incarcerate more children” until the matter can be debated at the NSW Labor Party Conference in July.
Inner West Mayor Darcy Byrne says the Labor Party must debate the government’s planned new bail laws for children.Dion Georgopoulos
He said party members were furious that a Labor government had taken such a hardline approach to children,especially disadvantaged Indigenous teens.
The laws,which have passed the lower house and will be debated in the upper house on Thursday,were in response to worsening crime in regional areas,where young people in areas such as Moree are increasingly breaking into homes and stealing cars.
The aged between 14 and 18 who are charged with committing serious break-and-enter offences or car theft while on bail for the same offences.
The government will also introduce a new offence for “posting and boasting”,which will include two years’ jail for anyone,including adults,who commits car theft or break-and-enter offences and shares videos of themselves on social media sites such as TikTok.
‘It’s heartbreaking to see the government seeking to put even more children behind bars.’
Inner West Council mayor Darcy Byrne
However,the,with the NSW Bar Association warning they would deliver a “troubling turn in the criminal law of this state”.
“Our regional communities,our most vulnerable children,and our state itself will be worse off if the parliament approves these amendments,”.
Byrne said the government had no mandate for “more punitive bail laws or to jail more children”.
“Labor Party members,who campaigned passionately for Yes in the recent referendum,are shocked and saddened that just a few months later the NSW government is proposing to make it easier to incarcerate Aboriginal children,” Byrne told theHerald.
People in NSW will face jail if they commit crimes and upload them to sites like TikTok.AP
“Aboriginal kids are proportionally amongst the most incarcerated young people on earth. It’s heartbreaking to see the government seeking to put even more children behind bars.”
Byrne,who was a youth worker with Indigenous children before he entered politics,said locking up children was “the single most destructive thing that can happen to a kid”.
“Labor Party members are distraught that just a few months after the referendum the NSW government is putting through legislation that goes against the entire ethos of the Uluru Statement from the Heart,” he said.
Several of Minns’ Labor MPs did not want the new bail laws rushed through parliament and urged the premier to refer the legislation to a committee.
On Thursday night,Labor MP Cameron Murphy spoke against the amendments during debate over the bail laws in parliament,saying the evidence showed incarceration did not result in improvements in community safety in the long run.
“We in the Labor Party went to the last election on a platform that committed … to closing the gap … This bill,even though designed with the best intentions … will ultimately send more Indigenous kids to jail,” he said.
“Despite my personal objections to it,I will be voting for the bill as it’s the decision of my caucus. It’s a decision they made,and I’m bound by it.”
Premier Chris Minns has acknowledged division in the caucus over the proposed bail laws.Oscar Colman
Minns said he managed to convince the majority of his MPs that the issues in regional NSW had to be dealt with urgently. But he acknowledged there was division in his caucus over the new laws.
Aboriginal Legal Service chief executive Karly Warner said the premier’s “dangerous changes to bail laws for children” was a betrayal of Closing the Gap and will fail to reduce crime.
“This is a devastating betrayal of Aboriginal children in NSW,” Warner said.
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