Policy submissions

Here you’ll find a wide selection of policy papers and submissions we’ve published. Each paper draws on our experience working with disadvantaged youth, families and communities.

2018/19 Victorian State Budget submission
- 21 December 2017
In our submission to the 2018/19 Victorian State Budget, Jesuit Social Services imagines all of the priority areas for this year’s budget sitting on a continuum of justice. As we look at the continuum – ranging from education and keeping kids in school, to child protection, and our justice, housing and mental health systems –…
Submission to the Public Housing Renewal Program
- 14 December 2017
Jesuit Social Services welcomes the opportunity to put forward our views on the Public Housing Renewal Program to the Victorian Legislative Council’s Standing Committee on Legal and Social Issues. We appreciate the significant role of public and social housing in providing much needed stability and security for many disadvantaged people in Victoria. We welcome the…
Outsourcing Community Safety: Can private prisons work for public good?
- 17 November 2017
Outsourcing Community Safety: Can private prisons work for public good? raises a number of questions about the purpose of prisons and the role of private providers. Prisons have a purpose and an opportunity: rehabilitation must be their focus, a chance to work towards a safer community. We urgently need to know whether privatisation is the…
Flourishing Communities: Taking lessons from place-based approaches, justice reinvestment and social cohesion
- 17 November 2017
Making Australian communities safer requires something more than the current policies on offer. The ever-increasing amount of money poured into prisons is not making us safer and could be put to much better use. Overlapping lessons drawn from place-based approaches to addressing disadvantage, justice reinvestment and social cohesion strategies reveal the ‘better use’ to which…
Submission to the ALRC Discussion Paper: Incarceration Rates of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples
- 4 October 2017
Jesuit Social Services welcomes the opportunity to respond to the Australian Law Reform Commission Discussion Paper: Incarceration Rates of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples. We believe the over-representation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples in the criminal justice system is a national disgrace. More than two decades ago, the report of the Royal…
Submission to the Law Council of Australia's Justice Project
- 4 October 2017
Jesuit Social Services welcomes the opportunity to provide feedback on the Justice Project’s consultation papers regarding access to justice in Australia. Our submission specifically responds to the Justice Project’s issue paper on people with disability. Our comments focus on the particular situation of people with acquired brain injury (ABI) who interact with the criminal justice…
Submission to the Visa simplification policy consultation
- 4 October 2017
Jesuit Social Services welcomes the opportunity to put forward our views to the Department of Immigration and Border Protection’s ‘Visa simplification’ policy consultation. In our submission we call on the Australian Government to ensure that any transformation of our visa system retains a nation-building focus: reuniting families, enhancing social networks, enriching our cultural diversity and…
Submission to the Inquiry into Drug Law Reform
- 21 September 2017
Jesuit Social Services welcomes the opportunity to respond to the Victorian Law Reform, Road and Community Safety Committee’s Inquiry into Drug Law Reform. In our submission we call for a reduction in the number of people interacting with the justice system because of drug use, and welcome approaches that treat drug use as a health…
Recognition respect and support: Enabling justice for people with acquired brain injuries
- 21 September 2017
In 2011, Corrections Victoria reported that 42 per cent of men and 33 per cent of women, in a sample of the Victorian prison population, had been diagnosed with acquired brain injury (ABI); this compares with just two per cent across the general population. The extraordinary overrepresentation of people with ABI in Victorian prisons reflects…
#JusticeSolutions: Expanding the conversation
- 28 August 2017
Youth justice is at a crossroads in Australia. In every state and territory across the nation, governments are grappling with youth justice issues as they seek to reduce crime, improve community safety and respond to public concern that is being fanned by sensationalised media coverage. In order to inform the discussions around youth justice in…