Page 4354 - Week 14 - Wednesday, 27 November 2013
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In terms of sending prisoners to New South Wales, I have indicated that I am willing to send prisoners to New South Wales where there is a benefit for the detainee, whether it is through access to a particular program that is not available at the AMC or perhaps one that is better delivered, or some other permutation, in New South Wales or where, for example, somebody requests to be sent to New South Wales to be closer to their family. I think the issue of the wholesale sending of people to New South Wales is not a path that I want to go down.
The whole purpose of having a detention facility in the ACT is that detainees might be close to their families. Their support network is there. They have that contact—and that is why we have the visits program—or that potential to be in contact with their families. Certainly from discussions with some of the detainees I have talked to in my time as minister, one of the key things that motivate them not to go back to the AMC is the fact that they have left their families behind, that they have let their families down, that they want to be there to support their wife in raising the kids. I think that constant connection to family is an important key motivator in the rehabilitative process.
We send people to jail for a number of reasons, including punishment and rehabilitation. Deprivation of liberty is the punishment, but the connection to family, I think, is an important part of rehabilitation. So the option of sending people to New South Wales is not off the table but it is one for which I think there is limited scope. Frankly, members will be aware, no doubt, that other jurisdictions are having significant prisoner population issues as well. And to be honest, neither New South Wales nor Victoria is particularly keen on just taking random additional prisoners from the ACT.
At the end of my amendment, I have added two further paragraphs. One is to commend the exceptional professionalism and commitment of ACT Corrections staff in responding to the increased pressures. I think considerable pressure has been put on the staff, and they have responded incredibly well. They have been innovative in thinking about how to deal with it, and they have been flexible in working with the superintendent of the AMC to deliver adjustments to the way the centre operates, in order to deal with those pressures.
Finally, I have noted that I will continue to keep the Assembly informed regarding developments at the AMC. I am quite open to coming in and making a series of ongoing ministerial statements as there are developments, along the lines of the one I made recently in which I informed the Assembly of the prison population issues and a range of other matters. I will continue to do that, as and when the opportunity arises.
That is why I have moved the amendment I have, and I commend that amendment to the Assembly.
MADAM SPEAKER: Before we proceed, Mr Rattenbury, could I draw your attention to paragraph 1(c) which says “with all which jurisdictions”. Could I suggest that you may wish to move, with the agreement of the Assembly, that “all” and “which” be transposed.
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