Yfoundations and Shelter NSW made a joint submission to the NSW Legislative Council Select Committee on Youth Justice focusing on the intersection of housing instability and involvement with youth justice – a relationship that is bi-directional, deeply entrenched and largely unaddressed by current policy settings.

The submission calls on the NSW Government to significantly expand the Bail and Accommodation Support Service (BASS), including the number of contracted providers and beds, with explicit geographic equity requirements to ensure coverage across regional and rural NSW.

It also calls on five further reforms:

1. Mandating Police to use the BASS, with the process redesigned to remove administrative barriers that currently discourage its use in practice.

2. Reinstating structured face-to-face coordination between Youth Justice workers and specialist homelessness service providers.

3. Embedding culturally safe, First Nations-led responses in all BASS expansion and associated services given the severe overrepresentation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander young people in the youth justice system.

4. Expanding investment in supported housing models for young people, with adequate supply and wraparound support across the spectrum of crisis, transitional and longer-term accommodation.

5. Raising the age of criminal responsibility in NSW to at least 14 years old, ensuring children are not exposed to detention as a consequence of poverty and housing insecurity.