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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2004 Week 03 Hansard (Thursday, 11 March 2004) . . Page.. 1083 ..

undertaken a review of the operation of the provisions of the act relating to home detention for sentenced prisoners, as required under section 100 of the act. The review covers a two-year period from September 2001 to September 2003.

The review’s primary focus was on the operational aspects of the legislation. Comments and feedback were sought from stakeholders, including home detainees and their families, correctional officers, the courts, Director of Public Prosecutions, the Department of Education, Youth and Family Services, ACT Policing, Legal Aid, the Law Society of the ACT, Victims of Crime Coordinator, the Aboriginal Justice Advisory Committee and the intersectoral reference group on women’s corrections issues.

The main findings of the review are:

• In general the provisions in the legislation operate effectively, although there are some minor amendments that would improve the operation of the legislation.

• There has been a low referral and uptake of home detention in the two-year period to September 2003—17 referrals for assessment, nine home detention orders made and eight successful completions. The reason for home detention not being taken up as a sentencing option needs further consideration and is outside the scope of this review.

• The eligibility criteria may overly restrict the number of offenders who are eligible for consideration of home detention. Conversely, the eligibility criteria may contribute to the high completion rate of home detention orders.

• Home detainees who successfully completed their order—eight successful completions out of nine orders—considered the option preferable to imprisonment because it allowed them to address their offending behaviour, maintain connections with family, complete schooling and remain in the workforce.

This review did not include a formal evaluation of the effectiveness of home detention orders as an alternative to imprisonment. This was because of the low number of people subject to orders during the period and the short time elapsed since they completed their orders. I have asked ACT Corrective Services to undertake an evaluation in 2005 to assess the longer term benefits of home detention. Home detention as a remand option became available in September 2003 and it will therefore be possible to review the effectiveness of this option at the same time.

Financial Management Act

Papers and statement by minister

MR QUINLAN (Treasurer, Minister for Economic Development, Business and Tourism, and Minister for Sport, Racing and Gaming): Mr Speaker, for the information of members, I present the following papers:

Financial Management Act—

Pursuant to section 14—

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