Equity and discrimination has topped a list of young people’s concerns for the first time in Mission Australia’s annual survey of older teenage Australians.
Released on Wednesday, the findings of the latest survey – which involved some 25,800 young people aged 15 to 19 years – revealed 40.2 per cent, when asked to list the three most important issues in Australia today, viewed the issue of equity and discrimination as a top national issue, well above the 24.8 per cent who saw it in such a way last year. The COVID-19 pandemic rated as the second highest with 38.8 per cent placing it in their top three.
The report also revealed 27 per cent of young people reported being treated unfairly during the past year with 41 per cent of those stating that this was due to their gender – something females were far more likely to report than males (48 per cent to 22.5 per cent). Other reasons for unfair treatment included ‘race/cultural background’ (30.4 per cent) and mental health (26 per cent). Some 55.3 per cent of young people reported witnessing someone being treated unfairly with 62 per cent reporting it was due to a person’s race or cultural background, 49.4 per cent saying it was due to a person’s sexuality and 40.5 per cent saying it was due to a person’s gender.
GRAPHIC: Courtesy of Mission Australia
James Toomey, CEO of Mission Australia – a national Christian charity focused on issues including homelessness, economic disadvantage, mental health and substance abuse, said the findings showed “loud and clear” that young Australians saw discrimination as a major issue.
“Dismissing young people’s concerns as gender politics is to miss the point, the message loud and clear is that young females and young males are concerned about gender inequality in Australia,” he said in a statement.
“Young people are also experiencing and seeing racial injustices in their day-to-day lives. Their own experience of this discrimination, alongside escalating media coverage, public dialogue and grassroots movements such as Black Lives Matter are likely to be affecting young people’s thoughts about the state of Australia and the world around them.”
Toomey called for a new national anti-racism strategy which includes a “commitment to partnering with young people to harness their voices and create initiatives to eradicate racism and discrimination”.
Elsewhere the survey found that, when asked what their biggest personal issue was, 34.2 per cent of young people said ‘education’, 17.2 per cent said ‘mental health’ and 9.3 per cent said ‘COVID-19’. Further analysis of the 9.3 per cent who said COVID-19 showed that the top four related concerns were around education (32.5 per cent), COVID-19 ‘in general’ (31.2 per cent), isolation (20.7 per cent) and ‘COVID-19 and mental health’ (17 per cent).
And when asked to indicate how concerned they had been over a number of issues over the past year, young people reported coping with stress, mental health and body image as the greatest concerns (42.5 per cent, 33.9 per cent and 33 per cent respectively).
GRAPHIC: Courtesy of Mission Australia
The survey also found that 42.6 per cent of young people said they felt stressed either all of the time or most of the time with the proportion of females indicating this double that of males (53.9 per cent compared with 26.8 per cent). But the majority of young people – 58.6 per cent – indicated they were ‘very happy’ or ‘happy’ with their lives overall while 55.5 per cent felt positive or very positive about their future.
Toomey said it was “heartening” to see “remarkable examples of resilience and strength shown by young people while facing 2020’s trials”.
“However, we remain very concerned that without the right supports and policy changes in place, COVID-19 will continue to have a scarring effect on many aspects of young people’s lives for years to come. Particularly in the wake of the pandemic, young people must have adequate opportunities to access support services, education and jobs when and where they need them.”
He called for additional efforts to address the mental health and well-being of young Australians as well as more targeted programs to help disadvantaged young people into work and an increase to income support payments to keep economically vulnerable young people and their families out of poverty and homelessness.
The survey was conducted between April and August this year with young people engaged through schools, community organisations and Mission Australia services.
