Ms Molly Joyce:

I can speak to that and I will check whether Ms McCreery wishes to add anything. We have published a number of reports previously talking about the importance of the 18 to 24 cohort as a specific cohort that needs specific kinds of approaches. As the Senator said, that is a demonstration that early interventions have not actually worked. One of our reports, which I identified in my submission, is about the importance of identifying that the right intervention at the right time can make a real difference but the wrong intervention, and this ties in with the point the Senator made about wrong interventions, for example, bringing a young person into the criminal justice system or a young person having a negative interaction with the police, can cause a significant amount of harm. It can entrench that young person in criminality or in a criminal identity, which can then increase the amount of time the young person ends up within the criminal justice system and make it more difficult for him or her to break out of it. The way I would describe it is that the stakes are higher when working with young people and that the right intervention can have a really positive impact but the wrong one can have a really negative impact. I would be happy to share the report with the committee because it goes into more detail about the evidence base for that. I will check if Ms McCreery has anything to add.