Law Council of Australia says NT government has known for 18 months that facility isn’t fit for children or adults

This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

The Law Council of Australia says the federal government must step in to close the Don Dale youth detention centre and urgently replace it with a purpose-built facility fit for children, following the latest disturbance – the third in four months.

The Territory Families department said the incident began “when young people started to be aggressive and refused to follow direction during the evening routine” on Friday night.

Seven teenagers gained entry to the ceiling space from their accommodation block then climbed on to the roof of the centre, triggering the fire alarm. Staff called police negotiators and the heavily armed Territory Response Group.

It was over by midnight, six hours later, but investigations are ongoing. Territory Families said those involved will be “held accountable for their actions”.

There have been several incidents of unrest and even a major fire at the centre since the royal commission into youth detention released its findings 18 months ago. Chief among the 230 recommendations was that Don Dale should close, and the age of criminal responsibility be raised from 10 to 12.

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Well before this latest incident, the Law Council of Australia said it “took the extraordinary step” of writing to the prime minister, Scott Morrison, and the Northern Territory chief minister, Michael Gunner, to request urgent intervention to close the facility and announce plans for a replacement.

“We wrote because we were concerned at the Territory government’s failure to act swiftly,” the Law Council president, Arthur Moses QC, told Guardian Australia.

The NT government promised to implement all of the royal commission’s recommendations, yet Don Dale remains open.

Moses said the Law Council was concerned the NT government did not have the resources it needed to implement the recommendations of the royal commission.

“And if they haven’t, we have taken the position that the commonwealth government has the constitutional right, indeed the moral duty to intervene to ensure that it is done,” he said. “We don’t even have a timeline as to when they intend to close the facility and intend to open a new one, which is an extraordinary state of affairs.”

There are currently 20 children in Don Dale, 11 of whom are on remand. The other nine are sentenced detainees.

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“It’s not clear what caused this most recent disturbance but what we do know is the facility is not fit for children,” Moses said. “It is a former adult prison deemed unsuitable even for adults.

“The NT government has known this for the best part of 18 months but has failed to act to remove the children from this facility.”

The president of the NT Law Society, Maria Savvas, also criticised the NT government for moving at a “glacial pace on this critical issue”.

“Riots in November 2018 highlighted issues relating to not enough staff being employed,” Savvas said. “Reports of a further disturbance at the facility over the long weekend underscore the urgent need for the NT government to act swiftly to remove children from this facility.”

A spokesman for the NT families minister, Dale Wakefield, said the government was “considering the letter”.