John MacDonald: Boot camps must not add to our abuse shame

Canterbury Mornings with John MacDonald

The plan to give “use of force” powers to the people running the Government’s new boot camps for young criminals is getting a bit of attention today. Or military academies as the Prime Minister was calling them this morning.

The Children’s Minister has got this idea that, if you’re involved in running a boot camp, you should have the same powers as the police and you should be allowed to use force.

The Prime Minister, though, doesn't seem to be so keen.

He’s going to stand up next week and issue a formal apology for the abuse that happened to kids in care in New Zealand over the years and he knows that giving “use of force” powers to the boot camp people could see history repeat itself.

Which raises the philosophical discussion about what these camps or academies are all about.

Or what they’re going to be about once the appropriate legislation has been passed that enables them to be set up and run as the Government wants them to run.

Because, as you’ll know, there’s a boot camp trial up and running and the Prime Minister’s been there and seems to have been impressed by what he saw.

He was talking this morning about kids helping out with landscaping and concreting work, and being busy learning about job interviews and writing CVs.

But remember that, because the relevant legislation hasn’t been passed yet, no one can be sent there or forced to go there yet. At the moment, it’s just kids who have volunteered who are doing the programme.

So, if they’ve put their hand up to be sent there, chances are they’re going to be the kids who will impress the Prime Minister because, if they want to be there, they obviously want to do something different with their lives. So, of course, they’re going to be motivated to help with stuff and want to find out what it takes to get a job.

It’s going to be a completely different story when you get kids being sent there by the courts.

And it’s at that point that the Children’s Minister wants people there who, effectively, will have the same powers as the Police and who will be able to use force to keep these kids under control.

But I can see why the Prime Minister’s a bit antsy about that. Because the last thing he wants to do is to give the green light for something that could lead to more abuse.

But if you can’t use force at a boot camp, then how does that make it any different to the facilities we already have for young criminals?

These are the youth justice facilities that Oranga Tamariki currently runs. OT is also running the boot camps. But if the boot camps aren’t any different than what we have at the moment —in terms of discipline— then why would you bother with them?

I don’t know if the Prime Minister has been to a youth justice facility, but I have. These are the places our worst young criminals currently go to and the one I went to was pretty much like a prison. A god awful, depressing place.

But they don't work. Yes, they keep these kids locked up, but I seem to recall that the re-offending rate is about 75%. That’s what makes them so depressing. Because for a lot of these kids, they do their time in youth justice and then graduate to adult prisons.

Which is why the Government wants the boot camps.

The question is: how tough should these places be? And what powers should the people running them have?

For example: I’ve got no problem with force being used if someone is endangering themselves or endangering others.

But should they be allowed to use force if one of these kids is refusing to get out of bed?

Because, while I think “use of force” probably sounds exactly like the thing you’d expect at a boot camp for bad kids, I think it could be another abuse in care disaster waiting to happen.

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