Victorian government commits $272m in state budget for more prison beds after bail reform

ABC NEWS (Australia)

The state government will spend $727 million dollars on jails as it prepared for an increase in prisoners in the wake of its new bail laws. But the plan has come in for criticism by the Opposition, the Greens and social advocacy groups.

Transcript

00:01Just outside Geelong, the maximum security Western Plains Correctional Facility has been

00:07largely sitting idle since it was built two and a half years ago.

00:11But it's finally ready to take prisoners.

00:13I'm excited. It'll give us a chance to demonstrate the skills we've learned off Squad.

00:17I feel pretty ready.

00:19And it can't come soon enough with the prison system already under pressure.

00:23Over the last 12 months we have seen an increase of over 20% in the adult system

00:27and over 70% increase in the remanded population in the youth justice system.

00:32With inmate numbers projected to increase further due to stricter new bail laws.

00:36We have the toughest bail laws in the country.

00:39The government is spending $727 million on 1,000 new adult beds,

00:4488 new youth justice beds and expanding the $8,000 sign-on bonus for prison guards

00:50to attract and retain staff. While the spending has angered some.

00:54We tend to still focus on old and tired and failed strategies

00:59like putting people into custody for extended periods of time.

01:03It doesn't work, it never has worked and it won't work again.

01:06The Labor Government in Victoria has their priorities all wrong.

01:09Others say it's not nearly enough to protect officers.

01:13We've got assaults occurring with excessive violence on a number of areas.

01:19But we've also got gangs starting to emerge in the youth justice facilities.

01:22So we see prison staff in a situation where they don't want to work in the prison system

01:27because they don't feel safe, they don't feel supported and they're leaving in drives.

01:31The Government says there will be stronger penalties for prisoners who assault staff.

01:36Where a staff member has been assaulted there should be an expectation of additional prison time.

01:41The Community and Public Sector Union says its members have sent a clear vote of no confidence

01:45in the commissioner for corrections. They say prison staff face physical and verbal abuse every day.

01:51It's certainly a welcomed announcement but we believe that there is still quite a lot to be done.

01:56It's not a matter of just pulling people in off the street and putting them into a unit in a prison.

02:01Prisoners will start being moved to Western Plains in July.

02:04in July.

02:07.

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