No Ordinary People - Raise The Age, NSW: Why Australia Still Locks Up 10-Year-Olds

A country that prides itself on fairness still locks up children as young as 10. That single reality cuts through the noise of “youth crime wave” headlines and forces a deeper question: what does it say about us when punishment becomes the default response to children facing deep disadvantage?

In this episode of No Ordinary People, Jade sits down with Emily Mayo from the Justice and Equity Centre and the Raise the Age NSW campaign to unpack what’s really driving youth justice in Australia, and what it would take to change it.

Emily brings clarity to a complex issue, explaining in plain terms what “raising the age of criminal responsibility” means, and why Australia remains out of step with global standards. She traces how the current system disproportionately impacts children already facing deep disadvantage — particularly Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children — not because of who they are, but because systems are failing to provide the support they need to thrive.

A crucial shift in the conversation is moving away from “what did the child do?” to “what is happening for this child?” Many of the young people caught up in the justice system are living with trauma, disability, poverty, homelessness, and unmet health needs. This isn’t about excusing harm, it’s about understanding the conditions that drive it, and what actually prevents it.

The episode also surfaces a fact often missing from public debate: most younger children in detention are held on remand, meaning they have not been found guilty. At the same time, some children are more likely to be policed and escalated for the same behaviours that others move through without consequence. It raises urgent questions about fairness, accountability, and what safety really means.

Cost is part of this story, too. With youth detention exceeding $1 million per child per year, the system is not only failing children - it’s a costly investment in outcomes we know don’t work. In contrast, early intervention, diversion, and community-led support consistently show better results for both young people and community safety.

Together, Jade and Emily unpack:

• What “raise the age” actually means in practice
• Why Australia still imprisons 10-year-olds
• The link between early criminalisation and lifelong system involvement
• How trauma, disability, and poverty intersect with youth justice
• The reality of children on remand and what it reveals about the system
• Why detention is expensive and ineffective
• What evidence-backed alternatives look like
• How narrative, politics, and public perception shape reform

This is a conversation about truth-telling, prevention, and what it really takes to build safer communities, and why choosing care over punishment is not just more humane, but more effective.

If this moved you, subscribe, share the episode with a mate, and leave a review so more people can engage with the reality behind the headlines.

This episode was recorded at the Nova Entertainment studios.

Raise the Age NSW Contact Details

RTA NSW Website – raisetheagensw.org.au

Watch the 'Ten Is Too Young' campaign video 

Watch the 'Better Way for Kids and Communities' video

Justice and Equity Centre website – jec.org.au

Email – info@raisetheagensw.org.au

Facebook – @RaiseTheAgeNSW

Instagram – @raisetheagensw

Join the movement

No Ordinary People is produced by Jade Harley, Director of Impact at UnLtd.
This podcast shares the real stories of charity founders driving change for children and communities across Australia, especially those impacted by trauma, poverty, racism, and family and domestic violence.

Every story is a reminder: hope is built one small act at a time.

Brand identity and cover design created by my beautiful friends at Cocogun.

Got a story to share or want to get involved? Reach out to jade@unltd.org.au
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Connect: Instagram @noordinarypeople_podcast and LinkedIn www.linkedin.com/in/jadeharley

Transcript

Welcome And Acknowledgement Of Country

Jade 0:06

Welcome to No Ordinary People. I'm Jade and I'm on a mission to give positivity a voice by sharing stories of everyday people doing extraordinary things. They're a reminder of the power we all have to make the world a better place. I want to start by acknowledging that we're recording today on Gadigal Country of the Eora Nation, and I pay my respects to elders past and present. I acknowledge that this always was and always will be Aboriginal land. Land where children have been cared for, taught, and held in community for tens of thousands of years, long before colonial systems of punishment and incarceration were imposed. As we talk today about youth justice, trauma, safety, and responsibility, we recognise that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children are disproportionately harmed by these laws, not because of who they are, but because of systems that continue to fail them. We acknowledge the strength, leadership, and solutions led by First Nations communities and their long-standing calls for care, healing, and community-led justice. And we commit to listening, learning, and acting in ways that uphold the rights, dignity, and futures of all children on this land. Today, we're talking about one of the least understood and most urgent justice issues in Australia, the criminalisation of children. My guest today is Emily Mayo, the campaign manager for Raise the H. Emily works at the Justice and Equity Centre, where she brings together legal advocacy, community voices, and evidence-led reform to challenge systems that criminalise children instead of supporting them. Emily has spent years working alongside young people, justice advocates, and communities, including time inside youth detention centres. And she now leads one of the most significant youth justice reform campaigns in the state. At its heart, this is a conversation about evidence, trauma, and community safety. But it's also about what happens when we choose care over punishment and what a better future could look like for kids and communities alike. Emily, thank you for joining me today.

Emily 2:13

Thank you so much, Jade, for inviting me. It's wonderful to be here. And especially, can I thank you for that lovely warm acknowledgement of country to bring in that really important message of the power and strength of Aboriginal families and communities is really important. So thank you.

Jade 2:29

Oh, you're welcome.

Emily’s Path From Arts To Justice

Jade 2:30

Emily, before we dive in, I want to go back a little bit. So you've been involved in activism and organising across very different movements. So from equal pay and reproductive rights to youth justice reform, all of which we can probably say have faced some strong political and cultural resistance. What drew you into this line of work?

Emily 2:51

Truth be told, Jade, I'm a failed actor. No, look, I'm very fortunate, I suppose, to have grown up in a family that very much cared about other people and cared about not only other people but the systems and structures that exist in our worlds that mean that some people get a decent go and other people don't. So I suppose from a young age I kind of understood deep inequalities and was always really interested in those things. When I was in my early 20s, as I said, I was a failed actor. And I was given an opportunity, an almost an opportunity to sort of audition for a TV series about a youth centre. At the same time, I was offered a job working in maximum security juvenile detention facilities running arts programs. And it was time to pick a path. And I picked a path, and I picked the path of working, running arts and programs inside what was then Yasmar Juvenile Justice Centre, which was a centre, the only centre in New South Wales for young children, young girls who were incarcerated. And so I kind of by default ended up working in that place. And at the time I felt like I was doing something kind of good. But as time went on, I learned that locking up children, no matter how nice you make it, no matter how many wonderful programs you run, is deeply harmful and damaging. And I watched the same children pass through time and time again in that juvenile detention centre. And here we are, 30 years on, and I'm part of a really powerful and exciting but difficult and challenging campaign to attempt to raise the age of criminal responsibility and stop young children being locked up. You touched on some of the other things I've worked on, and yeah, I don't do things by halves. There are some major kind of social barriers that prevent some people from achieving everything they possibly can. Major inequalities and din and discrimination that set a fundamental barrier for people. And I'm really interested in challenging those. The most difficult ones, because I have the privilege of being able to do so fundamentally. And with that privilege, I feel a responsibility to build power and movements and momentum to make substantial change.

Jade 5:27

Fantastic.

What “Raise The Age” Means

Jade 5:28

And for people listening who may never have heard the phrase raise the age before, how do you explain what this issue is about in really plain terms?

Emily 5:37

Yeah, here in New South Wales and across Australia, we collectively, through our governments, we send 10-year-olds to prison. But more than that, groups of children across this state and across this country are policed and they're over policed, and the impact of that is extraordinary. We are policing and incarcerating and handcuffing our state and our country's most vulnerable and disadvantaged children. We talk about vulnerable and disadvantaged, but let's face it, the large majority of children that are impacted by these terrible systems that cause very big harm to their children and do nothing to prevent crime, the majority of the children that are impacted at every level of these systems are Aboriginal children. This should be something that is very confronting for all of us. So raising the age of criminal responsibility is really a simple proposition. We are talking about a very, very, very small cohort of children that deserve better.

Jade 6:45

Yeah. I mean, I remember when I first heard that, that it was, you know, as young as 10 that we were over policing, detaining and locking these kids up. And I was aghast. I mean, I think, you know, and I've gone on a deep learning thanks to yourself and and co-workers at the Justice and Equity Centre and all the wonderful leaders that you work with. It's been, it's been a really hard lear lesson to sort of unpack, but it's so urgent and so important. So I just I want to kind of walk through like what does what does it look like for, you know, a 10, 11, 12, even you know, 13, 14 year old. Like, what does it look like in practice? Like, what are the things that those children are going through and what are the outcomes that that the evidence is telling us is happening to them?

Emily 7:30

I think the best way to look at this is to step it right back and to think rather than about the criminalisation and what's happening in that moment, is to step it back and focus in closely on it on these children and their needs. Yeah. So put put simply, there's been decades, decades of evidence in this country and around the world, but most particularly in this country, we have reports into death in deaths in custody that go back decades that talk about the demographic and the makeup and the situation for the particular cohort of children that we're talking about. So we have evidence that lasts decades. That means that the children we were talking about 30 years ago, who were 10, are now in their mid-40s and are are being impacted by what happened to them. And then every year after that, we have a new set of 10-year-olds coming through into this system. So I want to focus on the evidence about what we know about our failings. Yeah. So what we know about our failings is that extraordinary pieces of information that should be confronting for all of us, but also this evidence shows us very clearly what the answers are. So children that have developmental disabilities or neurological needs are massively overrepresented in this system. Children with disability with unmet needs and lack of support are overrepresented. Aboriginal children, children who themselves have been victims and witnessed to crime, most particularly domestic violence, children who experience housing insecurity, homelessness, poverty, children who are disengaged from school, children who have not had their basic health needs met, and I could go on and on. So what that tells us is that we have a small number of children with complex needs, however, they are not so complex that they are unfathomable. They are actually quite simple. So if we could pull together all the information we know, identify the children who have these particular sets of needs and invest early. And I'm not talking about 10, I'm talking about much earlier, invest much earlier in these children and these families and these communities, then we will not be at an end point. We are when we are relying on police to try and deal with the outcomes of major social failure. So this is the grim part. We're not saying police are terrible here. Police are left at the end point of failure. And who are we failing? Small children and very needy families and communities. So I think we need to switch the way we think about it.

Jade 10:21

Yeah, so it's the it's the really looking at that prevention rather than the crisis response.

Emily 10:26

Oh, absolutely. And I mean obviously that that we need I I just want to say that terrible things happen in our communities. And sometimes children are involved in these terrible things. Uh everybody who supports raising the age of criminal responsibility wants fewer victims of crime and fewer crisis incidents. We're not saying that these things don't happen. What we're saying is that when and if they do, the best response is one of care and therapy and positive intervention, not criminalisation. Because the moment you criminalise very young children, you cause them further harm. They're not developmentally able to deal with that level of punishment. It does know has no impact other than a negative impact in terms of future behaviours.

Why Policing Escalates Harm

Jade 11:20

Yeah. Well, let's talk a little bit about, you know, some of the situations and behaviours that that are most likely to bring children into contact with the youth justice system. Like let's let's kind of unpack those.

Emily 11:33

Look, one of the pieces of data that I think is really interesting is that if a child lives in the regions and remote areas, they're up to three and a half times more likely to be coming in contact with criminal justice systems when they're aged 10, 11, 12, and 13. I'd like to imagine that none of us would think that because someone lives in the bush, they're more naughty or more likely to do bad things. I think what we should be thinking about is the failures and lack of infrastructure and lack of supports in those particular areas. Now, there are kids out running amok. No question about it. All children have to learn and learn to be accountable and they need barriers that and supports that help them to develop those sets of skills. It's very rare that a child age 10, 11, 12, or 13 commits what we would frame as a very serious crime. Yeah. The children who end up in lock-up, almost 100% of them each year, year on year, who are in this age group are locked up on remand. They've not been found guilty of any crime. Children who are living oh look, I just said children who are quite privileged, who live in the inner city, who have resources and supports around them, they get up to mischief too. Yeah, right. Absolutely. They run the streets and do naughty things. But we don't respond to those children in the same way as we do the demographics of other children. So the behaviours are not less or more. But the really uh difficult thing to fathom is that the minute you police these naughty behaviours when kids are very young, the more likely their behaviours escalate into more serious behaviours. So it's always a challenge for us when we talk about what do we do with these naughty kids. At its fundament, we need to do everything everything we can much earlier that they're not in that difficult space. But when and if, and it will continue to happen, if we raise the age of criminal responsibility, there'll still be the occasion where a 13-year-old does something really bad. And bad for them, bad for everybody, harmful to themselves, harmful to others. But we need to ensure that the response is one of crisis and care.

Jade 14:00

Yeah.

Emily 14:00

Because putting them in a prison is not gonna get a good outcome.

Jade 14:04

Yeah, a hundred percent. And I think you know, everyone can put their minds back. You know, I certainly remember being a child. If I was, you know, if I was told by a teacher, and I was actually, I was always there was one teacher who's I'm not gonna name the name, but used to send me to the back of the class every time. I'd immediately be like, Well, uh uh, you know, well, I'm gonna live up to that. And there's it's a defence mechanism. So when you're over policing these kids, of course they're gonna get attitude because they're like, Why are you picking on me? I haven't done anything. And then that just kind of reinforces that, you know, it starts to build um an identity of them as being a bad kid, they start to self-identify as that. So I think we can all kind of, you know, maybe take a take a look back at our own behaviour when we were children.

Emily 14:44

I'm the I'm the child of two school teachers and school principal, and I grew up in the bush in regional New South Wales. I was extraordinarily naughty. Like I I truly was. It there's a thing about small country towns about the kids of teachers and cops. Yeah. And I was one of those children. I was I was I was pretty naughty. Yeah. But here I sit, I've never been sent to prison. I I was never policed, I was never because of the situation in which I was fortunate to to be in.

Jade 15:18

I think I quite like that link because that's the empathy, right? We all know a naughty child, or we all were a naughty child, but that doesn't mean they're a bad kid. It means that there's, you know, I love the phrase, instead of asking, you know, why did you do that? Like, what's happening for you? Because that behaviour is telling you something. It's a cry for help,

The True Cost Of Detention

Jade 15:34

right? Well, let's have a let's talk about the cost to taxpayers because I think, you know, this is the thing that sort of I look at and go, hang on a minute. Like, come on, like, hang on a minute. So, according to obviously stats, Raise The Age, NSW website, so keeping a child in youth detention can cost taxpayers more than a million dollars a year. Like, from where you sit, what does that level of spending tell us about our priorities as a society and and where our funding goes? And what else could that money be doing if the goal really is community safety?

Emily 16:05

Jade, I'm no economist, believe me. However, this really fascinates me and has increasingly over the recent years. The the that piece of data is absolutely known, so it costs more than a million dollars to lock up a child for a year. But what I think we need to unpick is the much broader costing issue that we're dealing with here. Because it's the cost of failure. And it's also the cost of the data we have is about when you lock up a kid. That's how much it costs. But that doesn't even uh begin to n articulate the bigger, broader costs. Think of the costs of policing, think of the costs of the court systems, think of think of the costs to victims, inverted victims, think of the costs to community. This is a this is a huge, huge budgetary decision. The other thing to think about is that the more people, the younger a child is when they're sent to prison, the more likely it is they'll be sent to prison across their life. Now, how stunning is that evidence? If we know that's true, that what does that mean? The more children we send to prison, the more prisons we need to build. So this is a longitudinal, massive budgetary commitment from governments. It costs a fraction. So if we just break it down, cost a million dollars a year to lock up a kid. There are programs here that have been evaluated and economic work has been done on them that that support 10, 11, and 12-year-olds. They're short programs, their early intervention, diversionary programs, that cost a fraction of these sorts of dollars. A fraction. And the NGOs out there that are running these particular services, they're few and far between, sadly, and they're they're spotted all over, and often the NGOs gather up money through philanthropists or running fundraisers, a bit of government money. They prove these programs work, and the government chooses to do what we do now rather than fund what we know works, right? So look, we we are work we are dealing with a big political nightmare of an issue. And let's face it, time and time again, as we approach elections, as we are here in New South Wales currently, in the next year we'll have an election. There is this absolute laziness that comes from our lead, our so-called leaders, when they lurch to law and order. They lurch to law and order because fear is a motivator. Hope is a motivator to hope is motivating, yes. And uh, our work really is about demonstrating to the public and the government that there is room to make good policy. Yeah. And that you can make good, hopeful policy and win votes. And the saddest thing about all of this is this is one of the most evidence-based pieces of policy that's before us. The evidence is in. Yeah. If we do differently, it will be cost saving. Yeah and it will do better for children and better for communities.

Jade 19:00

I mean, it just how do you stay, how do you stay hopeful? How when, you know, obviously change like this can take time, regardless of the the decade of evidence, regardless of all of the all of the different amazing orgs that that are all united with this, you know, with this call to government. How do you and the the core people working on this issue, how do you stay relentlessly hopeful?

Emily 19:29

I stay relentlessly hopeful because I know that the work of building power and powerful collectives and working together over time will make change. I stay hopeful because I have an 11-year-old. Yeah. I have it right in front of me every day, every day, I have an 11-year-old. And I my 11-year-old is a wonderful little human who's learning all kinds of things, just like normal little 11-year-olds. And I just think that we should all be hopeful about 11-year-olds, not fearful of them, hopeful about them. Even even when they're doing it really, really tough, small children deserve our care and hope.

Jade 20:18

Yeah, beautifully said. So, what happens to public safety if we don't intervene early and appropriately? Because again, it's that sort of that narrative in the in the media. It's you know, we all agree, and you know, we've discussed this many times. Yes, the outcome is we want safer communities. So, what happens to public safety when we don't do this?

Emily 20:39

Uh, we get more of we got now. What we get sorry, we get more of what we get now.

Jade 20:44

Yeah.

Emily 20:44

So the worse we do, the worse we do. We're not making communities any safer. But I mean the data tells us, and I think this sort of annoys people. We don't have massive crime waves in this state or in this country. This is just not a fact. However, facts unfortunately don't shift people in this discussion. It's desperately sad to me that we are breaching the human rights of children.

Jade 21:13

Yeah.

Emily 21:14

But talking about breaching the human rights of children, set of facts, not enough to make the change. Even talking about challenging people about the data and about the sort of this whole concept of crime waves, or even let's touch on it, this idea of adult time, adult uh sorry, adult crime, adult time, which is blossoming in Queensland. This flies in the face of all the evidence. Yeah. It's just clickbait. Yes. But it's orchestrated. It's clickbait, but it's more than that, Jade. What more critically than clickbait, it's it's punterbait bait, it's vote bait. Yeah. It's electoral manipulation m manipulation, yeah, which is, you know, really concerning.

Elections And The Law And Order Trap

Jade 21:59

So as we're approaching, as you mentioned, we're approaching an election. And the the thing I find fascinating learning from yourself and and others in at the Justice and Equity Centre was the fact that you know we've got different we've got different laws in different states, that this isn't a, you know, as much as I think this should be a federal decision, but it isn't. That's not the the reality. And obviously there's some really pro problematic language being used in states like Queensland. Can you talk a little bit about what's happening across the country and what you're seeing from a narrative and and how that's kind of manipulating voters?

Emily 22:35

It's grim, Jade. Only a few years ago, the the federal attorney general and all the attorney generals, they have a thing called the Standing Council of Attorney Generals. Attorney Generals are the sort of leaders of the land, leaders of the law in the land. They they all get together in their council and they deal with priority issues collectively or issues that they see that have both impact in estate jurisdictions and territory jurisdictions and into the federal jurisdiction. And only a few years ago, raising the age of criminal responsibility was one of their priority discussions, and they agreed that they should take a unified approach to this. This gave those of us that have been working, and I must say, there's people that have been working on this issue for decades. You know, this is a sh a long, long, long game. That gave us a small sense of hope. There was some sense that they would come together, put their heads in a room together, and maybe work together to come to a united kind of position. Um, that being the case, we would have to, of course, advocate and campaign into that space to ensure that whatever united position that they might come to would be one that's acceptable. But for reasons unknown or for actually reasons very well known, and that'd be the political cycle, all of that fell apart. And sadly, what has come of that has been despite the Northern Territory, for example, making some advances and raising the age of criminal responsibility to 12, in their election campaign, it w it it wound up around a youth crime debate, and there was a change of government. Both major parties played into this massive law and order discussion and tried to sort of outdo themselves on children are terrible and there's you know crime is overtaking your communities. And the result of that there was a change of government, and the new government brought the age of criminal responsibility backwards, back to 10. Then in Queensland, we saw, we Queensland, sorry, we saw what I think is the most, what we're seeing right now, what I think are some of the most hideous things I've seen in my lifetime, and I keep an eye on the worst things that happen around the world because I like to change them. In Queensland, we we they set aside human rights acts in order to be able to lock children in adult watch houses. That's just our and in ice isolating them in adult watch houses. And then in one of the most hideous election campaigns, we were introduced to the concept of adult crime, adult time. And now that's becoming policy in very various ways in in Queensland. I just want to touch on this, right? Like, we are talking about children. Yeah. And children do not commit adult crime. It's not it's not a logical set of concepts. Logic doesn't matter in this kind of fear-mongering and election electioneering and lazy politics. I call it very lazy politics. But all the evidence tells us that children are not capable of the same decision-making processes as adults. That's just that's just the reality. So if you treat a child like an adult, you are going to get a very poor outcome for both the child and the greater community. It's just it's just incredible. So here we sit. Look, let's give some credit where it's due. In the ACT, they have raised the age of criminal responsibility over time, and they stepped it out from 12 to 14, and so now the age of criminal responsibility is 14 in the ACT. Very small jurisdiction, you know, but a fantastic step along the way. There's been great commitments in Tasmania about all of this, but they reach out till 2029, and so none of it's been implemented. The the rest of the country is a bit of a basket case, to be honest. We had some great hope in New South Wales, great hope, but now we're one year out from an election, and to be blunt with you, we are now in a position where we need to be very careful about how we talk about this issue because we certainly do not want to be the instigators of inflaming a lazy law and order election. Yeah.

Building A Coalition For Change

Jade 26:43

Can we talk a bit about the the coalition? So, you know, what brought such a broad group together and and how, you know, that's that's a lot of people obviously very united in this in this endeavour. What's it been like learning, listening, supporting, walking alongside such an incredible, diverse group of orgs and not-for-profits? It's inspiring and exciting, and it's the great privilege of my day-to-day work.

Emily 27:10

We are huge. So here in New South Wales, we have more than 180 organisations that are part of what we call our partner network. That's a lot of people. So, in order to be able to kind of be organised and disciplined and structured and strategic and smart, we have what's called our lead group. And that's a group of organisations, of 13 organisations. And that group is made up of what we think it looks like a better way for children and a better way for communities. It's experts in the most importantly in Aboriginal community-controlled organisations, but it's also part of our group are legal experts, are the peak bodies of non-government organisations and important people like the Teachers Federation, the representative of teachers. As I touched on earlier, children who end up in in the criminal legal system are very unlikely to be engaged in school. Teachers do not want children not engaged in school. Teachers want kids at school, but in order to be able to do that, they need resources and support to support the most vulnerable children or the children who are most likely to disengage. So our lead group is made up of the a really powerful and committed group of organisations, and it's a real privilege to walk work alongside all of them.

Jade 28:29

Incredible. And for you know, we talk about the the better way for kids and communities. So this is the the sort of the second phase of the campaign that, you know, which is how I got to know you through Unlimited. So you've worked closely with with creative and media partners for this campaign. Why was it important to approach this as a storytelling kind of challenge rather than a pure policy one?

Emily 28:50

To be blunt, uh the evidence and the facts aren't working, are they? Right. Like so just you know, it's all before us. Decades of of facts are not are not doing the trick. So the support of the media and advertising and creatives has just blown us away, to be honest. So w in our worlds and in our work of social justice change is largely driven by non-government organisations and people who volunteer their time and who I feel deeply passionate about particular issues. Usually, when we try and tell the stories of our work, we wing it with an iPhone and a shitty car driving around trying to get people to tell stories that might have an impact. And we like to think that we do it really well because what we hold is these really good relationships with people at the front line. We hold trust, we hold knowledge about the issue, deep knowledge and care and a way to kind of relate to the front line of this, but we're not superstar creatives. So to be able to marry that trusting, deep understanding of complex issues with the brightest, smartest, creative people, and then find a place where that story can be told that both deeply meets the needs of people and is uh consent-based and very much led by community, but also hits the mark. It's complex to get that done. And without the support of all of the team that are backing us, we couldn't have done it. And so what we have now launching are these beautiful, beautiful, beautiful stories from leaders in the community about doing better, doing better for children and communities. This is our moment to open a space for government to do good policy. Simple. It's not a challenge to go, we're here and we want to do good policy with you. It's now time for the government to do better as well.

Jade 30:51

Hell yeah. What is there? So I know there's there's been some you know some early indicative kind of results of like how the campaign is landing with the general public and and any shifts in in sentiment and understanding and empathy. What are what are some of those initial signals that that give you confidence that when the government, I'm gonna say when, when the government decides to do good policy, you've got this huge network of incredible organisations ready to be mobilised with proven, with proven programs and interception that can turn these beautiful young lives around. So what are some of those early signals of success?

Storytelling That Shifts Public Opinion

Emily 31:29

I completely just repeat this same story over and over again because I cannot believe it. I can't believe it because we actually have evidence to tell us that it's true. But on running our first um piece of this campaign, the beautiful Ten is Too Young advertising campaign, we were touching on something that I was really scared about. Because there are a proportion of our society that are deeply angry about this sort of stuff, and rightly so in many cases, but also there are sections of the media and politics that rev up a certain group of people about these particular issues. So when you're campaigning to try and improve a matter like this, the very worst, worst, worst thing that can happen is that you ignite a fire in the bellies of those who feel deeply and strongly against you. So the most uh critical thing that we have achieved is that not only do we not inflame a particular set of angers in this campaign, we make these people stop and think, and in fact, a small proportion of them go from really being against this to being undecided or in fact supportive of this particular campaign. Now, why does this matter? Because politicians are deeply, deeply, deeply frightened of that group of people because they're very loud. The other most important and beautiful um part of this is so we know we shift hearts and minds, we know that those who are undecided are shift significantly to support, and we know that those are against do not inflame and in fact slightly tip towards support. But most critically, what this campaign does and what the evidence tells us is that it creates talkability. I know that's an advertising industry word that I've learned along the way. Um remind me to tell the out-of-home um story. Talkability. So why does talkability matter? Because we are trying to make major law reform and major government policy change. So when people are impacted positively by this, we know they're going to talk to other people. And every person gets to vote. So this is incredibly powerful powerful in terms of political campaigning, which is fundamentally what we're doing.

Jade 33:53

Yeah, fantastic.

How To Learn More And Share

Jade 33:54

For listeners who might be listening to this, they might be shocked or uncomfortable, potentially, you know, they're they're starting to question some deep seated kind of beliefs that might have come from they know someone who's been a victim of crime or something's happened to them themselves. What's the most important thing that they can do to educate themselves better, to really think of this through a different lens? Like, are there some places that people can go to learn more? Like, what would you suggest?

Emily 34:23

There's so much evidence in about this everywhere you go. They could read the hundreds or maybe I'm exaggerating, but but tens and tens of reports and recommendations out of government inquiries and reviews and so forth that just basically lay it all out in evidence. But that's really difficult and really challenging for people. And sadly, for people like me, we know unfortunately it doesn't even impact the politicians. So we can't imagine that the everyday person could be have the time or inclination to read all of those things. To be very honest with you, the most powerful and change and important way in which people could learn more is to head over, I shouldn't be self-promoting, but head over to raise theagensw.org.au. And there's a tab that's a better way, and it's the videos of all of these fantastic community leaders who tell in a very short and powerful way a story about what the government is doing to children now and what we could do differently. There's 12 leaders who have different views and perspectives, different people will connect to different one people of those leaders, but they're very powerful people, very powerful stories. Frontline workers, CEOs of places like the St. Vincent de Paul Society, Reverend Bill Cruz, there's representatives from the Aboriginal Legal Service. So I would encourage people to listen to those stories and and share them with others and discuss them because the more we talk about this challenging topic, the better.

Jade 35:55

Yeah, fantastic.

What Works Here And Elsewhere

Jade 35:56

Are there any examples in, you know, maybe not in Australia, but are there any examples in other countries where where change has been made and it's been for the like it's been an improvement for communities and kids?

Emily 36:11

I always I hesitate about this question a little bit because it's very much like it we we we we exist in a sort of cultural and social place. Australia is a very, very, very different place to other places in the world, and particularly given that we have to recognise that there's a deep racism and colonization hooked up in all of this for Australia, which I think makes it hard to kind of draw direct comparison about, you know, well, when they did this in this particular place or that particular place, this good or bad thing happened because it the way we measure and the way these systems work and the way social systems work in different environments is different. So, of course, in Northern Europe and they're they're far more advanced in this space, but their social policy is far different too as it relates to all kinds of things education, housing, social welfare. So the whole structures are different. So what I would say is that it's it's while it while it's what's the word, it's compelling to kind of reach for something and go, let's pick this off the shelf and put it here, it's not that useful. I think what we need to do is look at all the parts of different systems that work and make it work here. We need a very place-based approach here in New South Wales and across Australia because our situation is very much different to other places. But let's just look internally here in Australia. The ACT, as I said before, it's tiny. However, like it it's a matter of scale, isn't it? So ACT has done a model that works for the ACT. It's proven to be working, which is great. Why would we not start there and go, Radio, what do they do and what bits of that could work and be adapted for other jurisdictions, including here in New South Wales? Because it seems to me that the process by which they went to was very um thorough and it seems to be delivering for children and communities.

Jade 38:09

Which I find fascinating considering that's probably where the majority of our politicians live. Oh, well, I suppose federal ones, federal ones for sure. You know what I mean? So I kind of look at that and go, okay, and it it's often they're often quite innovative in that area and go, okay, so you've got a lot of people who get it that live here, and you're seeing that impact, but we're not applying that, you know, it's a test and learn approach, surely.

Emily 38:33

I think, well, I yeah, I think I mean it's interesting too that the ACT has raised the age, the the territory itself, but the federal government has been disappointingly absent in this space. Uh there's been some recent work done to illustrate that the federal government could in fact take action federally about raising the age of criminal responsibility and a whole bunch of other matters as it relates to children in contact with the criminal justice system. And let me just touch on that, that raising age of criminal responsibility is a very small part of a very big set of issues as it relates to criminalising of all people, all children most particularly from my kind of perspective. So there is there is guidance out there that the federal government could take action. There's currently a Youth Justice Senate inquiry underway where they're taking evidence about ways in which the community and experts in the field think that the federal government could do better. Will the federal government take this in their hands and be active in this? That's the question, and that's we need to it continue to apply pressure there. But as it stands, they generally refer all of these matters back to the states. Um the federal government is involved in some levels of intervention and funding across youth kind of justice spaces in in Australia. It would be really good to see um leadership out of the federal government.

Jade 39:53

Well, I mean, when it comes to like things like human rights, like that to me feels like it's federal, right? That is it's gotta be. But I I mean I'm completely novice. I and you know, and I'm not trying to hate on I honestly believe the major like majority of politicians, they go into it for the right reason. You're not gonna go into that. But understanding the complexity, and of course, there's a whole load of pressures. So I'm definitely not trying to be in any way kind of throwing shade at the government. It's just me asking those kind of like logical questions, thinking of it from a layman's terms and going, surely, A, you're testing it in one state, test it, look at what works, roll it out. B, it's human rights. The UN is is kind of throwing shade on us for this. Surely we don't want that as a country like Australia.

Emily 40:36

I appreciate your your generosity in this space as it relates to the way in which politicians act. I wish I could feel the same, Jade, but unfortunately, this country, regardless of what political party has led federally, has not necessarily been a fan of um people's human rights. We have a history of all kinds of human rights abuses in this, in this or failing failings and abuses in this country. And it's a real challenge for me because, you know, it the UN just t telling us that that we're doing the wrong thing, which they do every time they get the opportunity, through every process by which they can, because that's their job. But even that doesn't seem to shift people. So that's why we do what we do, you know, and that's why I do what I do, because uh if that doesn't work, then we need to we need to apply pressure. The UN doesn't get a vote in Australian elections. People get a vote in Australian elections. So evidence doesn't get a vote in Australian elections, people do. Yeah. So I think my work is hard and slow, our collective work as hard and slow, is to continue to remember that people vote in Australian elections.

Jade 41:45

Yeah.

One Thing To Do Next

Jade 41:46

Look, I think that's that's a pretty good place for us to for us to wrap up. So I always like to say if there's if there's one thing that, you know, one act that someone can take after listening to this and to hit to hearing you speak, what is that one thing? Vote, educate yourself, like you know, what what are the simple things that people can do that allow them to have some kind of power in something as huge as this?

Emily 42:13

I think it's a really simple ask because we know it works. Sadly, in New South Wales and across Australia, most people still don't know that we put 10-year-olds in prisons. So I think if today that is what you've learnt, if you could have a conversation with others about that to let them know that too, and have a genuine discussion about what that means for all of us. That's incredible, h incredibly helpful because the more people that know, the more people that actually find this deeply uncomfortable. Yeah. Most people do not think it's a very good idea. Even those who have had experiences that are really challenging and difficult, most people don't run around going we should be locking up 10-year-olds.

Jade 42:52

Completely agree. Uh well, Emily, I just want to say thank you for trusting us with this conversation and for the work you're doing to build power and make space for governments to make good policy and to do better for children and for all of us. I will put all of the links. I'm gonna put those links to the videos, I'll put the links to Raise the Age New South Wales, I'll put a whole heap of kind of links into the show notes. And I just want to thank you and all of the incredible orgs that are united in changing this. And I I really hope we get the right outcome that supports these vulnerable kids.

Emily 43:25

Thanks for having me, and I'm really confident that together we can. We can't stop. It's not it's not it's not reasonable to stop, so we will continue. Absolutely.

Jade 43:33

Thanks, Emily. We are need more light in your feed, follow and share. Be part of the movement to bring the balance back.