A Failed Society, from The Beacon (MUPMC)

May, 2025

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What kind of society considers incarcerating children as young as ten years old, as is being contemplated by the current Queensland Liberals? What kind of society would endorse this instead of questioning why children are committing crimes, examining the reasons why and arriving at solutions?

Child poverty in northern Australia is a deep and ongoing crisis, particularly among Indigenous communities. It is closely tied to the region’s colonial history, structural racism, underinvestment, and geographic isolation. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children are overwhelmingly the most impacted. In some remote communities, over 50% of Indigenous children live in poverty (compared to around 13% of non-Indigenous children nationwide). According to the Liberal/National government, the answer is to lock them up!

The legislation, introduced into parliament by premier David Crisafulli on Tuesday would also curtail children’s rights to protection from cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment while locked up, and contradict international and domestic human rights laws, the government has admitted.

Katherine Hayes from the Youth Advocacy Centre said the laws could result in 10-year-olds being imprisoned for life even for the non-violent crime of arson.

The Queensland youth justice minister, Laura Gerber, acknowledged her legislation, which amends the government’s “adult crime, adult time” laws passed last year, will disproportionately hurt Indigenous children.

…ln the statement tabled with the bill, Gerber conceded the laws violate the state’s Human Rights Act.

(The Guardian, 1 April 2025)

A moral and caring society would recognise that the system has failed these children, failed to help their struggling families, and failed to provide them with decent, affordable education. Children with secure homes, good education, children with parents who have a reliable job have a future and are less likely to commit serious crimes. So, when children rebel against a system that rejects them and a society that treats them with contempt, we punish them and lock them up instead of examining why and doing something about it!

Australia is one of the world’s richest countries, yet housing is out of the reach of many people, and our homeless population grows endlessly. Our health system is failing, our schools are underfunded, and teachers are undervalued. The decline can be traced back to the process of privatisation, supported and advanced by both major parties.

Whole suburbs are affected by the closures of banks, post offices, and police stations, depriving the people of these services and the opportunity for community engagement they once promoted.

Young people in their 20s claim to have no real future, no prospect of secure housing, no decent employment that allows them to earn sufficient wages to pay off their exorbitant university debt or to leave home and be independent. They have no security and therefore no future.

When our taxes are used to fund unnecessary wars and to purchase weapons from the US that will be obsolete before we get them, instead of meeting the needs of our communities, we know the prevailing system has failed. When billionaires (and now trillionaires) proliferate white further millions of people are thrown into poverty, we are a failed society. The Productivity Commission Report in 2024 says that poverty levels remain stubbornly high, with around one in seven people experiencing poverty in 2022.

What are the signs of a failing society? Economic decline, political corruption, social inequality, class conflict, environmental degradation, resource depletion and mandating 10-year-otd children to be jailed for life. Our society has failed. The question is: What do we plan to do about it?

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Melbourne Unitarian Peace Memorial Church (MUPMC):
https://melbourneunitarian.org.au/
The Beacon, A Failed Society, Article (scan upload):
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