Bringing-Them-Home-Report-Web

alternative facilities. At times, no arrangements are made for the presence of a parent orvisitor during the period in custody (Cunneen and McDonald 1997 page 183).Tharpuntoo Aboriginal Legal Service stated ‘one of the problems is that there is notavailable to Aboriginal juveniles on Cape York the same options [to avoid the use ofpolice custody] as are available elsewhere. For example there is no supervised bailprogram on Cape York Peninsula for young people’ (quoted by Cunneen and McDonald1997 page 173). Most Aboriginal young people who are arrested in the Cape region arebailed back to their community. Those who are refused bail are taken to Cairns thenTownsville. This results in a separation of hundreds of kilometres from family andcommunity.Data supplied to the Inquiry by the Queensland Government indicate that in everyyear since 1992 over one-half and sometimes more than two-thirds of young peopledetained overnight in police watchhouses were Indigenous young people. 6 The majorreason was that police refused bail. Indigenous young people, particularly thosetransported from remote communities, could wait between three and five days in thepolice watchhouse to be transported to a detention centre (Cunneen and McDonald 1997page 183-4). This is contrary to a protocol between the Department of Families, Youthand Community Care and the Police Service relating to custody of young people inwatchhouses. A young person should only be held in a watchhouse overnight if the youngperson will appear in court the next day and it is impractical to transport the young personto a nominated place immediately. A young person may be held longer than overnightonly if there are exceptional circumstances preventing transportation or bringing theyoung person before the court (Department of Family Services and Aboriginal and IslanderAffairs 1993 section 10-2).There is no reason to believe that the situation in Queensland is unusual – exceptthat it actually has available data on the number of Indigenous young people in policewatchhouses. Most jurisdictions are unable to supply regular data on police bail refusalsfor Indigenous young people. 7 Information from the 1995 Police Custody Survey showsthe extent nationally of Indigenous young people in police cells.As noted previously, the Australian Government made reservations to articles of UNtreaties relating to separation of juveniles from adults in police and prison custody.According to the National Aboriginal and Islander Legal Service Secretariat, this reflectsthe lack of commitment to fully implementing the recommendations of the RoyalCommission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody (Cunneen and McDonald 1997 page182). It has been argued that,… non-compliance with the requirements in the International Covenant on Civil and PoliticalRights and the Convention on the Rights of the Child should be limited to cases genuinelyrelating to the best interests of the juveniles or geographic necessity (Aboriginal and Torres StraitIslander Social Justice Commissioner 1996 page 207).The available evidence shows the widespread and disproportionate use of policecustody for Indigenous juveniles. The lack of alternative facilities may well explain thisin part. However, the lack of facilities is itself indicative of governmental failure to