Select Committee on the Increase in Prisoner Population Final Report

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LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL Increase in Prisoner Population man – without success. Meetings were held within the community into which he was to return were written to executive staff of appropriate departments, and nongovernment agencies were approached. JD was released to live with his mother without appropriate support, after a short time he stole a small item, when not arrested for this incident he approached the parole officer with a knife and threatened that he would use it unless he was returned to custody. He was released at the expiry of his sentence on 20/10/98. He is presently on remand for another bank robbery and is housed in the Disability Unit at the Sydney Police Centre. JD would not be a significant threat to the community if appropriate support options were available. After extensive attempts, it has not been possible to locate such services. 183 6.148 Probation and Parole also provide a bail assessment program, which is used to supervise people on bail as an alternative to them being held in custody. The <strong>Committee</strong> was advised however that the numbers are relatively small and it is not highly used by the judiciary. The program was withdrawn purely due to its lack of use. 184 6.149 The <strong>Committee</strong> is concerned that lack of community based facilities for mentally ill people and for people with intellectual disabilities may be contributing to crime in the community and resulting in the imprisonment of disadvantaged persons. 6.150 The Service is also responsible for writing pre-sentence assessment reports to assist judges and magistrates in determining appropriate sentences. The number of reports prepared for the Courts system has increased from 17,931 in 1995/96 to 23,824 in 1999/00. 185 6.151 During the Budget Estimates 2001, the Minister for Corrective Services was asked whether the Department of Corrective Services had or planned to have a measure of how often recommendations by Parole Service to divert offenders from custody were accepted by the Courts. He advised that the Department did not plan to introduce such a measure, because “all sentencing options are canvassed in the reports.” 186 6.152 A measure of the effectiveness in promoting the diversion of offenders from full time custody should be developed since this purpose is one of the major reasons that the reports are prepared and provided. In the same Response to Questions on Notice, the Minister also advised that the Court Advice Program is currently being reviewed. The <strong>Committee</strong> looks forward to the review of the Advice program being published. 183 Department of Corrective Services Submission 63 p106. Similar comments were made by an officer of the Grafton Probation and Parole Service, Mr Ozols during the hearing conducted at Grafton Gaol, 29 March 2000, pages 39-50, and to the Chair by staff of the Campbelltown Probation and Parole Service during a visit there on 7 September 2001 at which no transcript was taken. 184 McDonald Evidence 28 March 2000 p 48. 185 Department of Corrective Services, Annual Report 1999/00 p 24. 186 Response to Questions on Notice during Budget Estimates for GPSC No3 by the Minister for Corrective Services, p58. 102 Final Report - November 2001
SELECT COMMITTEE 6.153 The <strong>Committee</strong>’s Interim Report recommended a Separate Community Corrections Division be established within the Department of Corrective Services to raise the status of community based corrections within an agency dominated by a “culture of imprisonment”. 187 In the Government Response to the Interim Report, the Minister advised that the Probation and Parole Service already serves this function. 188 6.154 The <strong>Committee</strong> intended that the Probation and Parole Service should play a leading role in the proposed new Division of Community Corrections. The Probation and Parole Service has only recently been “returned” to the Department of Corrective Services. Until 1995, it was a part of the Attorney General’s Department, operating within Court Services. 6.155 There are a variety of differences between services, culture and requirements of community corrections to those of the full time custody program within Corrective Services. For example, the operational duties of prison officers require them to wear uniforms, use “military” style discipline and work place titles and even carry weapons. Probation and Parole officers do not wear uniforms and their workplace culture resembles more of a “therapeutic personal services” model. There is a greater emphasis in containing and controlling inmates in prisons, where as rehabilitation has a more paramount role in community corrections. 6.156 The management and resource needs of the smaller community correction branch can be easily “swamped” by the larger and more expensive requirements of the larger full time custody program. Of the 4,906 people working for the Department of Corrective Services in 1999/2000, about 87 percent of them perform tasks associated with providing full time custody of inmates. By comparison, 13 per cent provide community supervision. Ninety percent of the total expenditure of the Department of Corrective Services is allocated to programs associated with holding inmates in full time custody or providing them with assessment, classification and development services. Often the amounts allocated in the capital works budget for building and renovating new prisons equals the recurrent expenditure for community corrections. 189 6.157 The <strong>Committee</strong> believes that the recommendation in the Interim Report continues to have merit. Transitional Centres 6.158 As noted in the <strong>Committee</strong>’s Interim Report, the Department of Corrective Services currently operates the Parramatta Transitional Centre for women which provides a bridge between the institutional routines of a correctional centre and the living skills needed for the community. Preliminary figures suggest that since the opening of the Transitional Centre in 1996, only one woman out of the 84 who have been through the Centre has returned to custody. 187 Interim Report pp 158-159. 188 Government Response, 19 February 2001 p 15. 189 In 1999/2000, the capital works budget for the Department of Corrective Services was $60.9 million, while recurrent expenditure for the “Alternatives to Custody Program” was $49.4, Assessment, – DSC Annual Report 1999/2000. Final Report – November 2001 103
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Select Committee on the Increase in Prisoner Population Final Report

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