Tougher bail regime to harden young crims, critics warn

"After listening to Victorians, to victims of crime, to the advice of Victoria Police and to other representatives across the justice system, we needed to bring about a jolt to the system," she told reporters on Friday.

"We are seeing too much of a pattern of behaviour."

Australian retailers say there has been a spike in retail crime involving weapons in the past year, with incidents involving knives and blades up more than 40 per cent and an increase in violent or serious events of 30 per cent.

One in four retail crime events in 2024 involved some form of violence, intimidation, threats, or physical or verbal abuse, and the top weapons used were knives and blades, according to statistics released on Thursday.

Victorian retailers recorded the country's largest jump in both violent and threatening retail crime events, followed by Western Australia and NSW.

Retail representatives say governments at all levels need to prioritise the issue and implement tougher penalties for offenders.

Victoria's parliament in the early hours of Friday passed the Bail Amendment Bill, which removes the principle of remand as a last resort for children, makes community safety an overarching principle for bail decisions and reintroduces bail offences.

Tougher bail tests for serious offences will take effect in three months.

Ms Allan conceded more people will be remanded but said there is capacity in the system to handle the influx.

Indigenous, legal and human rights groups say the laws will needlessly lock away more people - particularly Aboriginal women and children experiencing poverty, family violence and mental illness.

"The Allan government has rammed through dangerous and discriminatory bail laws which will deeply harm Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities and breach human rights," they said in a joint statement.

National Children's Commissioner Anne Hollonds accused the government of looking for a quick political fix rather than acting on evidence.

"The data shows the number of children involved in crime has actually decreased in Victoria by three per cent," she said, adding that most of these children have unmet needs such as disabilities, health and learning problems as well as trauma and maltreatment.

"These are children in the most vulnerable of circumstances, and our 'early warning systems' of health, education and social services have failed to help them and their families."

Maggie Munn from the Human Rights Law Centre said the laws condemn generations of children and adults to the trauma of imprisonment and risk more people dying behind bars.

The Law Institute of Victoria said it remains concerned about the removal of remand as a last resort for children. 

"All the evidence shows that the earlier and longer a child interacts with the criminal justice system, the more likely they are to re-offend in the future," it said.

But Opposition Leader Brad Battin said the amendments should have gone further, describing the reforms as weak and diluted.

"Not only are these not the toughest bail laws in Australia, they're not even the toughest bail laws we've had here in Victoria," he said.

Shadow Attorney-General Michael O'Brien added the changes did not restore Victoria's bail laws to what they were a year ago.

Victoria tightened bail legislation in 2018 after James Gargasoulas drove into Melbourne's busy Bourke Street Mall while on bail, killing six people and injuring dozens more.

The laws were relaxed in 2024 after an inquest into Indigenous woman Veronica Nelson's death in custody found the changes were an "unmitigated disaster".

The parliament this week passed laws to ban the sale and possession of machetes in Victoria from September 1 and expand police search powers for weapons in designated areas.