July 06, 2023
Punishment won’t fix OT woes
A facilitator on the victims’ panel for the Abuse in Care Royal Commission says a punitive approach to state care won’t work.
Last weekend, a group of six rangatahi staged a rooftop protest on the roof of the Korowai Manaaki Ōranga Tamariki youth justice facility in south Auckland.
It prompted the ACT Party are to call for Corrections to take over the running of youth justice facilities, and the National Party said it would expand the criteria of its proposed young serious offender category.
Criminologist Tracey McIntosh says no one wants to live in fear, and the young people who come into care need to be given hope they can do better.
She says simplistic notions on law and order won’t produce the outcomes we want to achieve.
“Absolutely agree that we need to have a victim-centred approach and that victim-centred approach needs to be sitting very clearly in what do you do to uphold the mana of whanau and of tangata,” she says.
Professor McIntosh says often the loudest noises about social issues come from those who are least affected.