The latest political attack on Victoria’s bail system is misguided and dangerous: https://www.heraldsun.com.au/truecrimeaustralia/police-courts-victoria/manual-for-victorian-courts-still-advises-judiciary-release-accused-youth-criminals-on-bail-despite-claimed-crackdown/news-story/41c37c3a05ecb0e8f2b25dd3839063c0
The reality is that, since the recent changes to the bail system were introduced, there has been an explosion of prisoners who have been remanded in custody. This means that more people are being held in prisons who have been charged – but who have not been found guilty – of any offence.
We know that prisons are criminogenic. That means that putting a person, including a child, in custody makes it more likely that they will offend. It makes us all less safe in the long run.
It is important to recognise that we already have a bail system where “Parliament recognises the overarching importance of maximising, to the greatest extent possible, the safety of the community and persons affected by crime”. Further, a person must be refused bail if, amongst other things, they would “endanger the safety or welfare of any other person, whether by committing an offence that has that effect or by any other means”.
It is wrong to claim that judicial officers do not take these matters seriously, and misguided to attack the Judicial College’s Bail Bench Book, which is a resource for not only lawyers but the whole community. It also appears that there has been a total failure to consult people with actual experience as to how these reforms have affected things in practice.
Over recent years both major parties have placed penal populism ahead of a smart response to crime that will actually improve community safety.
We are all entitled to the presumption of innocence. Our political leaders, across the political spectrum, should take pause to consider what it means to lock people up when they have not had their day in court. Often those people will have a defence to the charges.
Do we really want a criminal justice system where people accused of criminal offences are regularly locked up for extended periods before trial in circumstances where they are not an unacceptable risk of failing to appear, committing a serious offence or to community safety?
Prisons are, once again, overflowing. Lockdowns and isolation in custody is commonplace. People are being held in police cells for lengthy periods. Where do people calling for even harsher bail laws expect these people to be placed?
The idea that remanding someone in custody pre-trial should not be a measure of last resort, or that bail conditions should not constitute the minimum interreference that is necessary in the circumstances, is a path to a draconian criminal justice system. It assumes guilt. Some people might decide to support such a system out of short-term political opportunism, but they will not support such a system when it is them, or a family member, or a friend, that bears the brunt of it.
We know that prisons are unsafe spaces, especially for First Nations peoples. Since findings of the Royal Commission into Aboriginal Deaths in Custody, over 600 First Nations Peoples have died in custody. These bail laws have already a disproportionate and deleterious impact on First Nations peoples. Breathtakingly, about 1 in 60 adult Aboriginal Victorians is now in custody.
Some in the media have decided to stoke community fear, assemble panels of faux “experts” and to fan the flames of outrage heading into the State election next year. The approach has been biased, with a failure to consult real experts with knowledge of what works and will improve community safety.
The politicisation of the bail system in Victoria has been a disgrace. It does us all a disservice. It makes us less safe.