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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 9 Hansard (4 September) . . Page.. 2906 ..

MR HIRD (continuing):

Recent events at the Belconnen Remand Centre make it patently obvious that this centre has outlived its usefulness, and the Periodic Detention Centre on Mugga Lane is hardly adequate for the safe housing of the majority of prisoners sentenced in the ACT courts. Building a new facility capable of housing all the Territory's prisoners and remandees would not only overcome the problems associated with Belconnen but also save the people of this Territory hundreds of thousands of dollars a year - dollars that this Government currently is paying out to New South Wales to look after our prisoners.

As the chair has pointed out, members of the Standing Committee on Legal Affairs had reservations about the need for the ACT to have its own correctional facility when we first sat to consider this problem. Like Mr Osborne and my fellow committee member, Mr Wood, I admit to being converted. There has been a lot of discussion in recent months about the possibility of the ACT taking over the already established but soon to be vacated Cooma gaol. That is not the solution to the ACT's correctional services problems. Cooma gaol, like Parramatta and many of the other older gaols in New South Wales, is outdated and old-fashioned and because of that has become uneconomic to operate. If it is uneconomic for New South Wales, how could it suddenly become an economic proposition for the ACT?

Mr Berry: How would you know? Have you had a look inside?

MR HIRD: Yes, I did look inside gaols, Mr Berry, and I did a thorough inquiry, as did your colleague, Mr Wood.

Mr Berry: How much time did you spend in there?

MR HIRD: In the early 1960s I did not see you in there - let me put it that way - when I was locking people up. I believe, as do my fellow committee members, that the cost of building a new prison in the ACT would be recouped in a few years if it were amortised over a given time. Currently, the average population of ACT prisoners in New South Wales correctional facilities is 108, and that figure is increasing. On top of that, the number of detainees on remand at the Belconnen centre ranges from 35 to 55 at any one time.

This financial year it will cost us an average of $135 per prisoner per day for every prisoner we send to New South Wales institutions; but that is a discounted figure achieved through negotiation by the ACT Director of Corrective Services, Mr James Ryan, to whom we must pay tribute for his negotiation skills. Last year it cost us an average of $159 per prisoner per day. That is an annual cost of $6.3m to the Canberra community. There is no guarantee that this current discount rate will be available in the future.

In any case, it is safe to assume that there would be savings if these prisoners were housed in the ACT, as indicated by Mr Osborne. If we build the right facility in the ACT - and I am talking here about a 200- to 300-bed facility capable of housing both male and female inmates, both long-term and remandees, in a full range of security classifications - we would be in a position to offer vacant accommodation to the New South Wales correctional service for prisoners from the region surrounding the ACT. That would become an even more realistic proposition with the closure of the Cooma gaol.

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