Keep booklet across the border
News of a disturbing new Victorian Government-funded booklet
aimed at young people emerged in the pages of News Weekly magazine last
month.
Under the heading Youth legal guide alarms families,
reporter Bill Muehlenberg explained in his opening line that the booklet had
“attracted widespread criticism”.
Entitled Am I Old Enough?, it pits young people,
according to Muehlenberg, “against authorities, against police, and
against parents”.
Passages from his article would certainly justify parental
alarm, and police concern. They read:
“...it tells young people when stopped by police that
they need only give their name and address. It tells young people that if
‘you decide to make no comment...stick with it for every
question’.”
“It tells children that they can carry certain weapons,
‘like a sword, a large crossbow or imitation firearm if you use it safely
and if you can prove you have a lawful excuse to use it’!”
“The drug advice gets even worse: ‘A charge of
possession can only be proved if you knew the drug was there’. Thanks
guys. That is certainly invaluable information for young drug users to have:
‘Drugs? What drugs?’ “
Muehlenberg writes that an adversarial approach is “seen
throughout this booklet.”
“It is as if a policeman has no right to go after
suspected lawbreakers,” he insists, “and that every police enquiry is
an invasion of someone’s rights.”
Muehlenberg concludes with the suggestion that parents would
“not be overly impressed” with the booklet. But how might
hard-working, front-line police react to it? As if their job was not already
burdened with ever more defiant juvenile offenders.
And what if, spurred on by the booklet, a child died of an
overdose, or shot his or her mate dead with a crossbow. What would Victoria
Legal Aid, the producers of the booklet, have to say then?
Commendable transit cops
And one place where police have to deal with plenty of young
offenders is on SA’s public transport system. Of course, transit cops deal
with them – and other offenders – with great efficiency, but they
would not welcome the added hardship of a Victoria-style legal guide.
At any rate, some might never have expected what they read in
The commuters’ guardians of the work of Transit Services Branch
members.
Clearly, their role today is more physically and mentally
demanding than ever before. And to carry on in the face of the ever-present
risk of assault in confined spaces is indeed commendable.
