Shadow Minister for Juvenile Justice, Catherine Cusack, today hosted a forum with local legal professionals and the Liberal candidate for Penrith, Tricia Hitchen, Liberal candidate for Londonderry, Bart Bassett and Liberal candidate for Mulgoa, Karen Chijoff to discuss the implications of the relocation of Children’s Court matters from Cobham to Parramatta. 

“We are utterly opposed to the relocation of Children’s Court matters from Cobham to Parramatta,” Ms Cusack said.  

“Centralising Children’s Court matters is a backwards step, and undoes the improvements of the past several decades when it comes to dealing with juvenile justice matters.

“It is going to make the juvenile justice system more onerous and difficult for families, and it will be children who are in trouble and who need help who will suffer the most.  

“The entire juvenile justice system is based around local families, local communities and local services, with magistrates who understand the local area and know where help is available.

“Moving these matters 30 kilometres to a central court in Parramatta will devastate this process.”  

Tricia Hitchen said that a centralised Children’s Court could leave children in need to be dealt with by a system that is incapable of understanding their needs.

“We could have a situation where a child from Penrith is forced to travel to court in Parramatta, and be appointed a Legal Aid solicitor from Pittwater,” Mrs Hitchen said.  

“Knowledge of and access to local services will be lost to those most in need,” she said.

Mrs Hitchen also said that removing Children’s Court matters from the local community would create difficulties for some in being able to access the Court at all.  

“We have a recent study from UWS telling us what we already knew; that the public transport in western Sydney is unable to meet the needs of local residents,” she said.

“How much worse will it be when children in the juvenile justice system are forced to travel about 30 kilometres to Parramatta to have their matters dealt with?”  

"The relocation of Children’s Court matters is just one of many critical local services that have been lost to the people of the Penrith area under the Labor Government.

“Once again, local residents are the victims of the Labor Government’s neglect,” Mrs Hitchen concluded.