The Northern Territory is this week set to become the first Australian jurisdiction to raise the age of criminal responsibility from 10 to 12 years old.
The move has been praised by health organisations and Indigenous groups, who say it will prevent children from becoming trapped in the criminal justice system.
But the plan has also come under fire from the territory's opposition, who say it risks encouraging youth offenders, and from paediatricians who say the age should be raised even higher.
So why is the territory taking this step now? And what do experts think will happen if it passes? Here's what we know.
How did we get here?
In all Australian states and territories, the current minimum age of criminal responsibility is 10 — much younger than most other developed nations.
Governments on both sides of politics have been under growing pressure to radically overhaul how they deal with youth offending since a Four Corners investigation into youth detention made global headlines in 2016.
At the centre of the investigation was the treatment of detainees inside Don Dale Youth Detention Centre near Darwin.
The shocking vision included in the episode led to a royal commission which, among other things, recommended raising the age of criminal responsibility to 12.
This is below the United Nations' recommended minimum age of criminal responsibility, which was set at 14 by the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child in 2019.
Last year, in an escalation of international pressure, 31 UN member states called on Australia to raise the age as part of the Universal Periodic Review.
The Council of Attorneys-General has discussed raising Australia's minimum age of criminal responsibility from 10 to 14 since 2018, when then federal attorney-general Christian Porter and his state and territory counterparts signed off on a federal review.
But so far, only the Northern Territory and Australian Capital Territory have announced plans to legislate the change.
How will it work?
The raising the age bill is expected to be debated in parliament today and, after lengthy discussion, is likely to pass this week.
Under the proposed legislation, children under the age of 12 will not be able to be sent to youth detention for committing a criminal offence.
Instead, the NT government says it will put more resources into "intensive parenting programs", family support services and various other schemes.
Chief Minister Natasha Fyles says these programs can help prevent at-risk children from committing further offences and has cited government statistics that suggest 60 per cent of children who participate in diversion programs do not reoffend thereafter.
Across the territory, she says, 590 children have participated in various diversion programs since the start of this year.
Attorney-General Chansey Paech has previously said he expects the changes to commence in 2023.
Why is the NT doing it now?
The Labor government has previously committed to raising the age before the end of their current term in 2024.
The legislation is expected to pass amid a spike in youth crime in communities across the territory — particularly in Alice Springs, where NT Police has deployed extra officers after a series of high-profile incidents.
But Ms Fyles says raising the age will have long-term impacts, arguing that children under 12 do not have the cognitive ability to understand the consequences of criminal punishments.
"We can't keep doing things the way we have been doing them in the past," she says.
"The earlier they have a touch-point with the criminal justice system, the likelihood is it will be prolonged and they will end up in the adult corrections system."
Mr Paech also says the "evidence is clear" that putting 10 and 11-year-olds in contact with the justice system does not deter reoffending.
"In fact, it is more likely to increase behavioural problems and offending," he says.
What do critics say?
The proposed legislation has come under fire from two main groups: those who don't believe the reforms should go ahead and others that say they don't go far enough.
The opposition's spokesman for Territory Families, Josh Burgoyne, says the plans to raise the age flies "in the face of what we're dealing with in Alice Springs".
Mr Burgoyne — whose electorate of Braitling covers the northern half of the outback township — says he wants to see more immediate measures to address the growing crisis.
"Whilst we're seeing more and more criminals on our streets, taking control of our streets at night, the Labor government's answer is to raise the age of criminal responsibility," he says.
"How can this lead to better outcomes in my hometown of Alice Springs?"
But the change has also been hailed as a "watershed moment" by various peak bodies representing the territory's legal groups, community services and Indigenous organisations.
"It's something that Aboriginal people in the Northern Territory, and all of our legal services and Aboriginal organisations, have really been fighting for a long time," Aboriginal Peak Organisations NT chief executive Priscilla Atkins says.
"In the Northern Territory, and at the time now, it's extremely brave."
But the Royal Australasian College of Physicians (RACP) says the reforms do not go far enough and that the age should be raised to 14.
RACP president and paediatrician Jacqueline Small says children between the ages of 10 and 13 do not have the developmental maturity or decision-making skills to be held criminally responsible, adding that 14 is the "absolute youngest age" this can happen.
"We know that many of these children in youth detention have suffered from severe trauma," she says.
"These are not mature children. Their brains have not matured to the age that they can take criminal responsibility and thus be justified to be locked up in jail."
What's happening elsewhere in Australia?
This week, federal, state and territory attorneys-general will gather again to hear the latest from a working group tasked with examining raising the minimum age of criminal responsibility across the country.
A spokesman for federal Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus says the government is "committed to turning the tide on the unacceptably high rate of youth incarceration".
"Our priority here should be keeping children — and especially Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children — out of the criminal justice system in the first place, while ensuring the safety of our community."
Tasmania has already moved to raise the minimum age of detention to 14, meaning children under that age will continue to be prosecuted but not sent to youth detention.
But only the Northern Territory and the Australian Capital Territory have committed to raising the criminal age of responsibility — a step further than lifting the minimum age of detention.
The ACT was the first jurisdiction to endorse raising the age of criminal responsibility, after the Legislative Assembly voted in favour of a motion showing in-principle support for raising it to 14 years old in 2020.
But work is still underway to draft the proposed legislation, which would see the age raised to 12 in the first instance, with plans to later increase it to 14.
