Snapshot 2007: Children and young people in Queensland
The 2007 edition of this annual 'snapshot' of children and young people in Queensland, produced by Queensland's Commission for Children and Young People and Child Guardian, updates and expands on the information provided in previous years. It draws on multiple sets of data and statistics related to children and young people, including information about population and family characteristics, health, disability and mortality, child protection, child care, education and employment, drug use, homelessness and crime.
Selected findings (taken from Chapter 2: Key statistics):
- In 2006, there were 529,891 young people aged 0-9 years (13.1% of total population) and 458,417 young people aged 10-17 years (11.3% of total population) in Queensland. In total, young people aged under 18 years made up 24.4% of the total Queensland population, while young Indigenous people (aged under 18) made up 44.8% of the Indigenous population in the state.
- Births to teenage mothers in Queensland decreased from 6.6% of all births in 1997 to 5.4% in 2005, while the teenage fertility rate (number of births per 1,000 females aged 15-19 years) fell from 25.6 in 1997 to 20.5 in 2005 (in the same period, the Indigenous teenage fertility rate fell from 84.9 to 66.7).
- Transport-related mortality rates for 15- to 17-year-old Queenslanders decreased from 19.7 per 100,000 in 1995-1997 to 13.2 per 100,000 in 2004-2006.
- In the period from 1995-1997 to 2004-2006, suicide rates among 15- to 17-year-olds in Queensland increased from 3.8 per 100,000 to 4.9 per 100,000 for females and decreased from 14.3 per 100,000 to 6.5 per 100,000 for males. The suicide rate among indigenous young people is three to five times higher than that of non-Indigenous young people.
- Year 12 apparent retention rates moved from 77.9% in 1997, to a peak 81.5% in 2003, to 78.5% in 2006. Between 1997 and 2006, Year 12 apparent retention rates for Indigenous students increased from 47.2% to 54.2%.
- The rate of 10- to 17-year-old Queenslanders in juvenile detention fell from 25.1 per 100,000 in 1997 to 21.7 per 100,000 in 2005. In 2005, the Indigenous youth detention rate of 188.1 per 100,000 was close to nine times that of Queensland youth generally.
Source:
Commission for Children and Young People and Child Guardian (Queensland) 2007, Snapshot 2007: Children and young people in Queensland, Commission for Children and Young People and Child Guardian (Queensland), Brisbane, viewed 30 August 2008, http://www.ccypcg.qld.gov.au/about/publications/snapShot07.html