Between 1 July 2013 and 30 June 2017, young Indigenous Australians aged 10–17 were 17 times as likely as their non-Indigenous counterparts to have been in both the child protection system and under youth justice supervision.
Research shows that children and young people who have been abused or neglected are at greater risk of engaging in criminal activity, and of entering the youth justice system. Young people who had received child protection services were 9 times as likely as the general population to have also been under youth justice supervision. Nearly half of those under youth justice supervision had also received child protection services. Of the 3,711 young people who had received both child protection services and youth justice supervision between 1 July 2013 and 30 June 2017, most (81.7%) had received child protection services as their first contact during the measurement period. Females under youth justice supervision were more likely than males to also receive child protection services.
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