Australia

Let's talk it over

from Julia Proctor's article in The Age: Course road test: Bachelor of arts (advocacy and mediation) at Victoria University Sounds a bit different . . . Funny you should say that. This three-year degree, at VU's Footscray Park campus in Melbourne's west, is unusual, says course co-ordinator Deborah Tyler, who adds that there is nothing else quite like it in Australia. The course brings together elements of social policy, law and conflict-resolution training, preparing students for positions involving advocacy or mediation on behalf of disadvantaged groups or individuals involved in conflict.

School takes no bully approach

from Sarah Collerton's article on ABC News: ....Some parents have accused schools of ignoring bullying problems, while others have looked for strategies to stamp out "modern" schoolyard violence. But Brisbane Catholic school Villanova College is using an alternative method to tackle its bullying problem. The school, for grade five to senior boys, implemented restorative practice (RP) in 2004, inspired by an Australian Story episode on a former policeman's restorative justice work. Villanova says it no longer uses the term "bully", instead preferring "wrongdoer", "offender" or "the guy who did the wrong thing". And it regularly holds Circle Time, which involves small groups of younger students talking about things that are worrying them. In more serious cases of bullying, there is the "powerful and emotionally gruelling" Community Conference, where parents, teachers and other key stakeholders intervene.

Therapeutic jurisprudence, restorative justice and brushfire arson

from Michael King's entry on Cutting Edge Law Blog: Last Thursday and Friday at the Monash University Conference Centre in Melbourne I took part in a symposium organised by Monash Sustainability Institute, the Australian Institute of Criminology and others about preventing bush fires.... A key feature of the symposium was its multi-disciplinary approach – professionals from the fire services, police, psychology, corrections, criminology and the law explored the different aspects of the motivations behind, detection and investigations into and prosecution and sentencing in relation to bush fire arson. Identifying potential arsonists and greater community education were other matters considered at the symposium.

Youth Justice in Western Australia

from the Executve Summary of the study by Dr Harry Blagg: The aim of this paper is to advance debate about the future of youth justice in Western Australia. The focus is on how we can improve outcomes for the small number of children who are coming into contact with the criminal justice system. It argues that youth justice practice has been allowed to drift over the past decade, principally because of lack of focus on the specific needs of young offenders due to the subordinate status of youth justice within what is essentially an adult focused correctional bureaucracy, and because of waning commitment to the principle of diversion on behalf of the police. These two phenomena are interconnected. Lack of clarity regarding the role of youth justice has led to a decline in the quality of support for children and families at risk, which has, in turn, undermined confidence within the police regarding the benefits of diversion from the system. Diversion is simply about choosing the least intrusive option when dealing with young offenders.

Victoria’s Neighbourhood Justice Centre

from the paper prepared by Courts and Tribunals Unit, Department of Justice, Victoria for the Indigenous Justice Clearinghouse: Community Justice Centres are neighbourhood-focused centres that seek to enhance community participation in the justice system, address local problems, and enhance the quality of local community life....Centres often vary in their model and focus but generally share a motivation to address crime and safety concerns locally, by developing effective relationships and links with the local community. Community justice centres challenge traditional methods of the criminal justice system. Rather than focusing on responding to crime after it has occurred, they seek to develop new relationships, both within the justice system and with stakeholders from the wider community, and to trial new and innovative approaches to community safety... A feature common to the various kinds of centres around the world is that they seek to respond in innovative ways to issues that may be otherwise considered negligible in the traditional criminal justice system.

Real People, Real Stories: Victims Face Fear and Find Healing in Prison

The Sycamore Tree Project® (STP) brings indirect victims and offenders together for a series of in-prison meetings to discuss crime and its impact. Recently, the Australian Broadcasting Company radio programme "Street Stories" followed two victims as they participated in a STP course in Acacia Prison. Through the interview, the victims tell their stories of victimization and describe the myriad of emotions and thoughts they experienced in the programme.

New Report Explores Indigenous Conflict Resolution Mechanisms in Australia

In September the Indigenous Dispute Resolution and Conflict Management Case Study Project released the report Solid work you mob are doing: Case studies in Indigenous Dispute Resolution and Conflict Management in Australia. The report presents recommendations for improving conflict management work in the Indigenous context drawn from three in-depth case studies and several smaller snap shot studies.

Footpaths to pathways

Tony Mulder is the Police Commissioner/Alderman of Bellerive, Tasmania, Australia. He writes in his blog: Alderman Tony Mulder has called for a change to Community Service Orders (CSO) for young offenders. Alderman Mulder’s call was prompted by his apprehension of two youths in the act of vandalising the bus shelter near Rosny College on Sunday night. “I’ve given the matter some thought”, Ald Mulder said “and current CSO tasks like painting out graffiti do not provide a pathway toward social re-engagement.” Instead, Ald Mulder suggests compulsory attendance at a pre-apprenticeship TAFE course. “If they don’t engage, it is no different to a CSO, but if they commit, they gain a pre-apprenticeship qualification and important employment and life skills.”

Proportionality in Sentencing and the Restorative Justice Paradigm: ‘Just Deserts’ for Victims and Defendants Alike?

 

Restorative Justice Research Unit

The restorative justice research unit [of Murdoch University] incorporates all aspects of restorative justice in the criminal justice system, including research into various aspects of imprisonment as well as the use of restorative processes in the workplace, schools and community. The Unit also focuses on the use of restorative justice processes as a tool to promote healing within Indigenous communities impacted by intergenerational trauma, violence and child sexual abuse. (excerpt from site)

South Australia: Nunga Court II – Aboriginal Sentencing Conferences

The Nunga Court of South Australia was established in 1999 to provide a culturally relevant sentencing option for Aboriginal offenders. 2005 legislation legitimizing the Nunga court required that victims be given the opportunity to participate in addition to the offender, elders, and community members. In response, the regional court in Port Lincoln is piloting an Aboriginal Sentencing Court incorporating elements of the Nunga Court model and restorative conferencing and sentencing circles from Canada. This article summarizes a paper by Dr. Andrew Cannon, Deputy Chief Magistrate and Senior Warden for South Australia, describing the new Aboriginal Sentencing Conferences. A link to the full paper is below.

Diverting Young Adults from Prison in NSW

The New South Wales (NSW) Bureau of Crime Statistics and Research recently released an evaluation report of a pilot community conferencing programme targeting young adults. The programme seeks to divert persons between the ages of 18 and 24 from prison to community conferences. The report discusses results from a survey of conference participants as well as interviews and focus group meetings with key stakeholders in Liverpool and Tweed Heads – the two local courts participating in the pilot programme.

. Hearing the voices of Victorian conferencing practitioners – views on neutrality.

Conferencing is a restorative justice process that is used in the criminal justice system in Australia to deal with a variety of offences. In this article, the authors analyse research into the understandings of conferencing practitioners regarding the issue of the neutrality of the third party in facilitating the process. The research was conducted using a qualitative methodology with a small group of practitioners in Victoria. In the semi-structured interviews the practitioners described and discussed their understandings of the concept of neutrality in conferencing and their thoughts regarding practice issues. The analysis of the study results indicates a need for further research in this area.(author's abstract)

Bolitho, Jane. Creating space for young people, dialogue and decision making : youth justice conferencing in New South Wales Australia.

This study examines the process of Youth Justice Conferencing in New South Wales within the context of the theory and aims of the restorative justice movement. Analysis of relevant literature and theory suggests that restorative justice is a broad and encompassing movement that entails a decision making process where victims, communities and offenders come together in a joint response to an offence. Although this breadth has allowed and encouraged a proliferation of programs that respond to particular needs and particular demands of culture and social context, the consequence is that both understandings and practices of restorative justices are variable. When theoretical understandings are so varied there will necessarily be a lack of commonality in the way principles are articulated. If practice is not linked directly to principled theory it is inevitable that processes will be vulnerable at all levels to the interaction between context, situations and participant characteristics that may easily deflect the focus from the true purpose of restorative justice. This thesis attempts to clarify the restorative principles relevant to the NSW program with reference to Braithwaite and Pettit’s republican theory (1990) and their notion of dominion. In turn these principles are used to identify five practical elements to be used as a framework to guide youth conferences. Such a framework highlights potential areas for improvement in conference preparation and practice. A case study approach was used to collect data and involved the observation of eighty five Youth Justice Conferences in three New South Wales conferencing regions. As well, one hundred and fifty two currently practising Youth Justice Conferencing practitioners (Police, Conveners, Managers) in New South Wales completed a mail out questionnaire. Findings from the study suggest that conference processes are influenced by the presence or absence of five particular elements: the attendance of victims, the attendance of communities, the attendance of offender support, reparation to victims, communities and offenders and the experience of non-domination during the conference space. However, findings also suggest that ‘situational’ factors may mediate these key elements to enhance or compromise the overall process. This thesis suggests that many of the issues arising in NSW conferences result from the failure to articulate the links between restorative justice theory and practice. While in NSW such links may intentionally have been unarticulated in order to encourage a freedom within the process, in reality the lack of clarification has led to a freedom in discretion that sometimes diminishes the chance of success. Therefore it proposes the need for a more articulated translation of theory into principles that will in turn frame practice. In this way the thesis uses the normative theory proposed by Braithwaite and Pettit (1990) to provide an explanatory and ideal framework for best practice in NSW Youth Justice Conferencing. (author's abstract)

Editor. The Charter of Victims Rights and Beyond: Helping Victims to Recover and Regain their Physical, Psychological, and Emotional Well-Being

The Charter of Victims Rights protects and promotes the rights of victims of crime in New South Wales and sets the standards for their appropriate treatment by government and government-funded criminal justice agencies, including Corrective Services. (excerpt)

Editor. A victim-offender conference: putting the people most affected by a murder, the victims, at the centre of the process

After two young men fight resulting in the death of one, it takes eight years before a victim-offender conference is held. The conference brings peace to both the victim's mother and the offender.

. The Australian Context – Restorative Practices as a Platform for Cultural Change in Schools.

The implementation of Restorative Practices in Australian schools is moving at a frenetic pace, with practice developing in most states and territories. The quality of that practice and the approach by practitioners is variable, dependent on their background, experience, passion and interest. It is a time where we need to stay open, stay in communication and explore together what assists to build quality practice in an educational context. We have reached tipping point and we need to manage that so that it tilts in the right direction. Poor implementation will have a dramatic effect on how schools view the long term viability of working restoratively. (excerpt)

Daly, Kathleen. Diversionary Conferences in Australia: A Reply to the Optimists and the Skeptics

Conferencing is probably a good idea. However, it is not as trouble-free as optimists argue nor as dreadful as skeptics fear. On items I can compare, my findings from a small set of cases in two jurisdictions in Australia are strikingly similar to Maxwell and Morris' (1993) major study of conferencing in New Zealand. (author's abstract)

McGinness, Anthony and Murphy, Peter. A strategic review of the New South Wales Juvenile Justice System.

In approaching this task, the Review consulted widely including representatives from NSW agencies, academia, the Non-Government sector, other jurisdictions and with members of the Government and Opposition. Members of the public also made a range of submissions that were considered by the Review. The Review spoke with young people who were caught up in the juvenile justice system – this provided a very different perspective. A key task of the Review Team was the development of an evidence base to understand leading practice in Australia and overseas. This report consequently provides a comprehensive description of juvenile justice more broadly and more specifically about how it operates in NSW. (excerpt) The incorporation and use of restorative processes are discussed in the report.

. Police diversion of young offenders and Indigenous over-representation.

This study aimed to contribute to the emerging literature examining disparity in the use of police diversion and whether the impact of police diversion on re-contact varies based on Indigenous status. The study addressed three research questions: • What proportion of Indigenous and non-Indigenous young people had contact with the juvenile justice system and what was the extent of this contact? • What processes were used to respond to offending by Indigenous and non- Indigenous young people and was there disparity based on Indigenous status? • What impact did police diversion have on re-contact with the juvenile justice system for Indigenous and non-Indigenous young people? (excerpt)