Page 248 - Week 01 - Wednesday, 13 February 1991
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world. How appalling it is that it is now being said by a person whose views command the utmost respect that the New South Wales prison system is falling below those minimum international standards. Those comments, reported in the Sun-Herald on 10 February, were indeed endorsed by officers of the Prison Officers Association, who were reported in the Sydney Morning Herald of 11 February as having said:
Overcrowding has forced too many prisoners into cells and under this Government -
referring, of course, to the Greiner Government and Minister Yabsley -
education, welfare and medical services for prisoners have been reduced ... Overcrowding is wrong and it does cause us major problems.
It appears that, in New South Wales, staffing has been cut by 10 per cent in the past two years, but gaol populations have risen in that same time from 4,300 inmates to 5,700, and it is expected that, as an impact principally of the so-called truth in sentencing legislation, there may be something like 8,500 to 9,000 prisoners in New South Wales gaols.
The position in New South Wales prisons is of extreme concern. When the Human Rights Commissioner suggests that conditions in an Australian prison system fall below the minimum international standards in the torture convention, it is a matter of shame for all Australians. It is a matter of particular concern for us because, of course, 200 years after settlement of Australia, we continue to transport prisoners to New South Wales - what an extraordinary proposition that is - and our prisoners are subject to these appalling conditions.
The principal rationale of the Nagle royal commission into prisons, which seemed to turn the New South Wales prison system back in the right direction until the Yabsley administration, was that people are sent to gaol as punishment, not for punishment. It appears increasingly that that goal has been rejected in New South Wales, and that the purpose of prison is seen as being for punishment, not as punishment. The recent concerns by the Federal Human Rights Commissioner are reflected fully by this Opposition and they compel us to make these additional comments today.
MR COLLAERY (Attorney-General) (4.21), in reply: I thank Mr Connolly for his comments. I do not want to make any cheap shots in this debate and I am grateful that Mr Connolly did not seek to make any either. I am sure he appreciates the difficult position that we are in, but I will allude to that in a moment. The fact is that Brian Burdekin has quite properly drawn attention to issues that
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