Page 3162 - Week 12 - Wednesday, 18 November 1992
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The two-line summary of the South Australian Health Commission study concluded that:
The conditions for spread of HIV within the prison system exist but at the current prevalence of infection, transmission can be expected to be infrequent. The opportunity exists now to improve and expand preventative measures.
That statement is most important because it highlights the need for the ACT to improve and expand preventative measures to reduce the spread of HIV and AIDS infection.
Madam Speaker, I would like to comment now on what the Remand Centre in the ACT does and its function as part of the ACT legal system. It was built in 1976 for a capacity of 18 detainees and at that time set national standards for the condition of cells. Since then its capacity has been expanded to cater for 24 males and five females. People are held at the Remand Centre while they are awaiting trial or sentence on a range of major charges. As well, juveniles are held on remand where Quamby is deemed to be not suitable. Illegal immigrants are also held on remand at Belconnen. Many of these inmates are in and out in a matter of days or weeks, but a significant number spend longer periods there because of the complexity of their cases, the length of time they need to wait before their cases are heard, or the lack of alternatives. We have heard only recently of a situation where a magistrate had to release a woman with slight intellectual disability and psychiatric problems who had been in the Remand Centre for eight of the past 12 months because of a lack of other suitable facilities.
Recent trends identified in the Paying the Price report of the ACT Corrections Review Committee in December 1991 indicated an increase in the number of remandees who spent more than a month in the centre. Numbers have risen from 59 in 1988-89 to 84 in 1989-90. The committee also noted with concern that several detainees spent more than a year in the Belconnen Remand Centre, while one person had been there for 18 months. This is especially alarming when compared to the fact that only one in 10 Australian prisoners remain incarcerated for more than 12 months, while the average prisoner is released in a little over five months. These are the people who have actually been convicted of crimes. Whether the stay in the Belconnen Remand Centre is 18 months, 18 days or 18 hours, there still exists a percentage of remandees who are engaging in risk taking behaviour, and these people have yet to have been proved innocent or guilty of the crimes they have allegedly committed.
Another issue identified by the ACT Corrections Review Committee report that causes concern in public health terms is overcrowding and the actual design of the complex. The 1991 study quoted Keith Brightman, superintendent of the Belconnen Remand Centre, as saying that the facility was "small, inhumane, provides poor working conditions for staff and is structurally incapable of providing any up to date custodial programs". Without the capacity for these programs to operate effectively, and with limited space for recreational activities available for detainees, the time spent in custody awaiting trial or judicial decision can be frustrating, boring and, indeed, frightening. Duncan Chappell, in "Issues in HIV/AIDS in the Prison System", wrote:
In some prisons, the closed, generally overcrowded, understaffed and stressful environment of the prison is conducive to a number of high-risk activities that are associated with the HIV virus.
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