Time to Read

10–15 minutes

In the heart of Melbourne CBD, surrounded by high-rises and busy roads, a group of teens desperately look for ways to survive, snatching food from tables to settle their growing starvation, they should be at home eating with family as most people in their peer group are, but they aren’t lucky enough to have a loving and caring family.

Lily Smith* was 16 years old and homeless, after years of abuse she had been kicked out and was forced to sleep on the streets. During her time without proper housing, she found herself surrounded by other young people who had already been on the streets for some time and quickly learned how to survive. 
Smith was taught to beg and steal; this thrust her into the journey that her friends had already begun. Committing crimes became the root of her survival. Smith remembered that the young people around her would say “it’s easier [getting arrested] than finding another roof to sleep under,” as the alternative option was a life filled with robbery, begging and constant substance abuse.

“It’s getting really hard to stay clean,” Smith had mustered up the courage to call her caseworker, it was a particularly difficult Saturday night. Smith’s caseworker immediately decided to take the two hour and forty-minute journey from Apollo Bay to Melbourne’s bustling CBD and placed Smith into emergency accommodation.

Lily Smith now works as an outreach worker and primarily focuses on trauma informed care through kickboxing sessions, during her toughest years she found her outlet through the sport, it was a way to recharge. Smith continues to support and guide young people into healthier forms of self-expression through kickboxing.
Smith’s history and experiences allow her to connect with young people who find themselves in similar situations she once found herself in and she takes pride in being able to help those in vulnerable situations.

According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) data from the 2021 census shows that 23 per-cent of all people experiencing homelessness in Australia are youth (12-24 years old). 27 per-cent of youth facing homelessness are located in Victoria.

Currently there is no youth homelessness prevention program, instead the focus has shifted on a social and affordability housing plan which was announced earlier this year (2023), the plan is dedicated to all Victorians facing homelessness and plans to develop 6,000 homes and apartments across Victoria.  Along with this the plan includes using surplus government (after government use) land for new housing development. The five-year plan includes facilitation and supply of social and affordable housing with development and implementation worth a sum of over $58 million for the Homes for Victorians strategy.
On the 13^th of February 2023 the Andrews Labor Government committed to building over 130 new homes for young Victorians, this was implemented to address youth homelessness and create the support that people facing homelessness need. The $50 million investment will be shared between eight registered housing providers and community service organisations and the homes will be built in accessible locations, situated near public transport, education, and employment. Some of the housing options being built include youth foyers, youth supported accommodation and projects that focus on Victorian youth leaving out of home care, such as residential care units. About 3,600 young people aged 15-17 transition from care each year, about 35 per-cent are estimated to be Indigenous Australians.

The government needs to address the young people coming out of out-of-home-care with the disadvantage these youth face, including less access to further education and employment opportunities. These individuals may be aged out of the system and find themselves without a roof over their heads. The Children, Youth and Families Act 2005 seemed to establish assistance from the government to provide young people leaving care with aid in adequate housing, employment, education, training, legal advice, health and community services and counselling and support. However, due to the phrasing of the Act there is no legal obligation that the government assists in any of these necessities. Government assistance is not enforceable by law and is not an entitlement for those leaving care, according to the Children, Youth and Families Act 2005 (Section 16(2)).
According to the Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute many youth who leave care go straight into homelessness, this is due to poor transition planning, no dedicated housing service and limited affordable accommodation services available.
The Australian Institute of Family Studies has consistently reported poor outcomes for those who leave out-of-home-care, with issues arising in areas such as housing, substance abuse, training and employment, mental health, financial hardship, social disconnection and interaction with the criminal justice system.

1,200 young people aged 15-24 came to a Victorian Specialist Homelessness Service in 2021-2022 and many of those individuals had suffered long-term mental health issues due to being homeless from such a young age.

From 2021-2022 crime rates committed by youth had been decreasing steadily according to data by the ABS, however, in 2023 the crime rates are beginning to rise once again. Crimes such as assault, dangerous driving and aggravated residential burglaries have risen, specifically within the youth cohort.
Currently the Children’s Court Youth Diversion Service (CCYD) is a pre-plea option for young people with little to zero previous connections with the Youth Justice system. The CCYD works as an alternative to other programs which prevent the offender into further progression into the criminal justice system. The other options for Youth Justice include police cautions, Ropes and the deferral of sentencing with group conferencing.

The Ropes program, a one-day interactive education program also acts as an approach for the police force to build rapport and connections with first-time young offenders.
Over the course of 2012-2020 Ezra Jones* worked within the Victorian police force, employed as a general duties officer in the City of Yarra at the time.
General duties officers act as a first responder to crimes and the public’s needs. Through this role he interacted with many young people including first time offenders.

“The age of offenders has stayed relatively the same [post COVID], we have noticed that younger children have started committing more serious offences and the severity of the offences in younger offenders has increased.”

While Jones was in that position he assisted in the Ropes diversion program, which was implemented by Victoria’s legal court system to promote alternative avenues of youth development. 

“Our Ropes program was at our local rock-climbing centre, and we would build a rapport with these kids, we would work on trust and let them know they can trust us and that we trust them when we’re climbing up the walls.”

In addition to the Ropes program, focus groups and discussions aimed at working through issues that the youth might be facing and third-party explanation on the risks associated with continuous offending work as a preventative to further criminal convictions.

“Ultimately it’s our initiative and the courts initiative to try and get these young offenders’ home, through bailing them or a courts summons —- we prefer to do that unless it’s some pretty serious offending.”

After the young offender has been processed at the police station and gone back home, an external counselling and wellbeing agency is contacted by Victoria Police as a resource for these young people to use. The Victorian Police Force collaborates with youth workers to assist adolescents in creating tactics which will benefit the young people in the long-term, such as court ordered counselling.

“I would often have phone calls where some parents where very different to other parents, they wouldn’t necessarily come from a rougher background or have a criminal past themselves [the parents]. We would often get quite loving well-to-do families. They were almost blown away that their child was in a police station —- It [the family situation] varied greatly.”

Interestingly, the youth offenders don’t fall into a specific category of ethnic background, financial class or family situation, there are no explicit indicators of who will offend, the coverage of youth crime tends to feed into the racist bias that some members of the public hold, with comments on social media platforms placing the blame of the “crime wave” on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders,  Sudanese-Australians and other ethnic groups.

However, in 2020-21 Indigenous Australian youth made up 46 per-cent of all young people under the supervision of the youth justice system. The over-representation of this group is caused by the social and economic circumstances of Aboriginal people. This has been recognised by The Victorian Aboriginal Affairs Framework, the link between higher crime rates and previous and ongoing generations of European colonisation created a disruption of culture, social exclusion, racism, economic exclusion, and many other issues for Indigenous Australians.

Jack Navin a residential care worker had just moved to Queensland from Melbourne, it was his first week at his new job. Navin was already nervous and as he read the case file of his newest client, he saw that the young person had just came out of Cleveland Youth Detention Centre. Navin wanted tonsure that he build a connection with his client, he wanted to engage and understand the young person as the day progressed however, towards the end of Navin’s shift the client had breached the condition of his bail and absconded (left placement without permission). Navin then spent the rest of his night searching for the young person and trying to get him back into the car and back into the care unit, this took Navin three hours and the result of the child leaving care was getting caught by the police.

Jack Navin had previously worked in Melbourne as a residential care worker but has since moved to Northern Queensland. The population of Indigenous youth within the justice system is higher in Queensland than in Melbourne, this could be due to the population of First Nations people who live in Queensland being higher than those living in Victoria.

“It appears that a lot more Indigenous kids up North Queensland are getting more in trouble with the law.

A lot of these kids who are about 12-16 are going through this juvenile system and once they are out it’s not too long before they’re back in, it’s the cycle that these kids are in.”

As a youth worker Navin isn’t responsible for judging, policing or fixing the young person’s life, instead the focus is on supporting the young person through the situations they find themselves in, offering assistance. Youth work focuses on empowerment of the individual to help themselves first. The young people under the care of youth workers need to know that there are people available to aid them in any situation and that they do have external support.

“At the end of the day when you’re a youth worker you’re not a judge, you’re not a police officer, and you’re not their parent.”

Young people need more assistance and community engagement programs, early intervention and diversion programs are already supporting the youth cohort who access them. The Victorian Government has implemented a new ten-year Youth Justice Strategic Plan (2020-2030) to reduce the number of incarcerations of youth. Personalised case management for every child and young person acknowledges the distinctive needs and risks while interacting with the Youth Justice system, rehabilitation, reconciliation, and education are a primary goal of the engagement system, which aims to transition young people back into education and employment pathways. 

Youth Offending Programs allow the young people to address outstanding offences, this along with community engagement builds upon the reintegration of young people into society. The crimes and the planning for types of offences create an expanded offering of the Youth Offender program with differing needs and risks of the young people considered. Targeted interventions and supports as well as incentives for good behaviour provides young people with the opportunity to progress into less-restrictive accommodation units. The focus of education is further explored by the implementation of a structured day overseen by the Department of Education and Training.

Overall, the introductory steps have been taken to address this ongoing and ever-present issue within our society.
Homelessness, transitional housing, crime, and the prevention of these issues for young people’s futures can be helped with the correct implementation of these strategies. 

Government funding and appropriate resources as well as social support is needed in order to create a better future for young people.

*Names have been changed due to privacy concerns