Criminal law · 18 September 2026
On 17 September 2026 the Queensland Parliament voted to send young offenders to court-ordered rehabilitation in remote locations for up to six months. The politics were loud. The evidence on whether it will work was barely in the room. Here it is.
What actually reduces youth offending? It is the only question that matters, and it is the one the Queensland Parliament spent the least time on before passing the Youth Justice (Circuit Breaker) Amendment Bill 2026 on 17 September.
The model, as reported by the ABC, is court-ordered rehabilitation at facilities in remote locations, for up to six months, with electronic ankle tags, for up to 60 young offenders, rolling out later this year. Labor voted against it. The Youth Justice Minister, Laura Gerber, framed it as a promise kept: "We told Queenslanders we would establish two Circuit Breaker programs in remote locations to remove youth offenders."
The Opposition Leader, Steven Miles, framed the risk: "We are concerned about safety and serious concerns about lack of oversight."
And the national Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children and Young People Commissioner, Sue-Anne Hunter, asked the question that should have been on the order paper. Pointing to Queensland's 2013 boot camps, she said: "What is different this time?"
Start with the Queensland Audit Office. Its 2024 report "Reducing serious youth crime" found that "reoffending has increased from 64 per cent in 2018-19 to 69 per cent in 2021-22". It found the number of serious repeat offenders "increased by 65 per cent from 442 in 2018-19 to 728 in 2022-23", and that "in 2022-23, serious repeat offenders committed 55 per cent of all proven youth crime".
That is the baseline. A program that returns a 69 per cent reoffending rate has changed nothing. A program that improves on it modestly has done something. Only a program that is measured against it can claim either.
Now the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare. Its 2024-25 national youth justice data records that "four in 5 (80%) young people in detention on an average day were unsentenced". That is, most children locked up in Australia on any given day have not been sentenced for anything. And "First Nations young people aged 10-17 were about 23 times as likely as their non-Indigenous counterparts to be in detention".
Those two figures are the context for any new custodial or quasi-custodial program. A remote facility that draws mainly from the same population as detention will draw mainly First Nations children, and any oversight failure will fall on them first.
The Circuit Breaker Bill does not arrive on a blank slate. The Making Queensland Safer Act 2024 commenced on assent on 13 December 2024, applying adult penalties to children for 13 specified offences. A second tranche in 2025 added 20 more, bringing the total to 33, including arson, torture, kidnapping, rape and attempted murder.
The government's position is that tougher sentences and now remote rehabilitation form a package. The independent evidence on the first part of that package is not yet published in a form that allows anyone to say whether it worked. That is the pattern the second part should not repeat.
The Queensland Family and Child Commission's Principal Commissioner, Luke Twyford, made a submission on the Bill. Among his concerns: "I continue to advocate for the removal of the provision of the bill which provides an excuse not to report harm if there is a risk of self-incrimination." A rehabilitation program for children that carries an excuse not to report harm is a design choice worth scrutiny.
In August 2026, Sue-Anne Hunter published an open letter urging the government to withdraw the Bill.
The Queensland Human Rights Commission, whose role includes advising Parliament on legislation that engages human rights, did not make a submission. Its Commissioner, Debbie Platz, told the ABC in July: "On this occasion, we have not provided a submission to the government about the bill."
The Katter's Australian Party, whose leader Robbie Katter said "we have raised this policy 165 times", counts the Bill as a win.
There is no shortage of Australian evidence on youth justice, and the consistent themes across audit offices, sentencing councils and health data are these. Reoffending is driven by a small cohort of serious repeat offenders with overlapping disadvantage. Programs that work are intensive, individualised, culturally safe for First Nations children, and connected to the community the child returns to. Programs that fail are the ones that treat removal as the outcome.
Remote camps can in principle fit the first description. Whether these ones do depends on things the Bill's passage did not settle: the qualifications of staff, the therapeutic content, the connection to schooling and family, the exit plan, and who is watching.
If the government believes the camps will work, it should welcome measurement. Here is what it should publish, in advance, before the first child arrives.
None of that is radical. It is what the 2013 boot camps were never held to, which is why nobody can now say with confidence whether they worked. Sue-Anne Hunter's question, "What is different this time?", has an evidence-based answer available. The government only has to commit to producing it.
Tougher punishment is a political choice, and Queensland has made it twice in two years. Whether it reduces youth offending is an empirical question, and the answer is not in yet. The Circuit Breaker camps will either be the first Queensland youth justice program measured against its own baseline, or the next one argued about for a decade without data. That choice, unlike the vote on 17 September, is still open.
Queensland legislation passed on 17 September 2026 establishing court-ordered rehabilitation for young offenders at facilities in remote locations. As reported, participants can be ordered to attend for up to six months, will wear electronic ankle tags, and the program will accommodate up to 60 young offenders, with the first facilities to open later in 2026.
The Queensland Audit Office's 2024 report found reoffending increased from 64 per cent in 2018-19 to 69 per cent in 2021-22. Serious repeat offenders rose 65 per cent over the period to 2022-23 and committed 55 per cent of all proven youth crime.
According to the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, four in five, or 80 per cent, of young people in detention in Australia on an average day in 2024-25 were unsentenced.
Yes. The AIHW reports that First Nations young people aged 10 to 17 were about 23 times as likely as non-Indigenous young people to be in detention in 2024-25. In Queensland, the Audit Office found First Nations youth made up 69 per cent of serious repeat offenders in 2022-23.
The Making Queensland Safer Act 2024 commenced on 13 December 2024 and applied adult penalties to children for 13 specified offences. A 2025 amendment added 20 further offences, bringing the total to 33.
At minimum: reoffending at 12 and 24 months measured against the existing baseline, outcomes for a matched comparison group on other orders, cost per participant, a public oversight record of incidents and complaints, and the demographic profile of participants including First Nations status and disability.