NT youths may be detained at Wickham Pt

Youths being held at Darwin's Don Dale juvenile detention centre may be moved to the Wickham Point immigration detention centre, which until recently held asylum seekers.

The Northern Territory government is looking for alternative locations to hold the 39 or so children detained at Don Dale, following the airing of footage on the ABC on Monday night that detailed multiple instances of child abuse by officers at the centre up until 2015.

In the face of an imminent royal commission, the government has promised to shut down the centre and build a new youth justice facility.

Education Minister Peter Chandler said Wickham Point was one of many options being considered to house the children in the meantime.

"We've got an immediate problem to deal with, how can we deal with that better?" he told reporters.

"We aren't dealing with angels here, we aren't dealing with children that comply in the first place to many instructions, and ultimately you have got to have an environment better suited to the needs of juvenile (detainees)."