Children as young as 12 being strip-searched: Is this the answer to festival drugs?
Reforming laws around the strip-searching of children by NSW police will require a delicate balance of meeting public expectations while keeping young people safe, the government says.
Officers watch on as revelers flock to the Listen Out music festival in Sydney's Centennial Park in Sydney. The NSW Greens have renewed calls for pill testing and an end to drug dogs and strip searches at music festivals following a damning report exposing the police canines' low success rate. (AAP Image/Samantha Lock)
Legal advocates say the practice needs to be paused immediately until a way can be found to properly protect children, hundreds of whom are subjected to strip searches each year.
Police Minister Yasmin Catley said she had met with stakeholders and she was considering changes to strip-search policies.
“It’s important to balance community expectations with community safety,” she said in a statement on Tuesday.
Premier Chris Minns said policy would be reviewed but police procedures were in place to help prevent dangerous drug use.
“Ultimately, the decision by NSW Police, particularly around music festivals, goes ahead so that young people, in particular, don’t take illicit drugs and it doesn’t lead to an overdose death at music festivals,” he told Nine’s Today program.
“It’d be far better if these illicit substances weren’t taken before people entered these music and rock festivals,” he said.
The comments follow reports that more than two dozen children – including some as young as 12 – were strip-searched over summer, with data suggesting Indigenous youths were disproportionately targeted.
More than 1500 children have been subjected to invasive searches by police since 2016, representing an average of about 220 every year, Redfern Legal Centre said in a report published on Monday.
“Strip searches in NSW have become routine and often do not meet the required legal thresholds,” the report said.
“The effects of these searches are lasting, leading to trauma, shame, embarrassment, and a fear of police.”
The report underscored the urgent need for reform and should prompt the government to immediately pause the searching of children while it finds a way to protect their rights and dignity, the centre’s police accountability solicitor Samantha Lee said.
“Strip searches constitute an invasive, humiliating and harmful process and should only be used in exceptional circumstances when no other alternative exists,” Ms Lee said.
NSW Police have been contacted for comment.
Legalise Cannabis MP Jeremy Buckingham in October moved a motion in the parliament’s upper house calling for the government to ban strip searches on children suspected of drug possession, noting that 58 per cent of strip searches found nothing illegal.
The motion was rejected but not before Regional NSW Minister Tara Moriarty told the house data relating to past strip searches could be cause for concern in the community.
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