VIC: Private youth jail on drawing board, says opposition

AAP General News (Australia)
04-13-1999
VIC: Private youth jail on drawing board, says opposition

By Peter Barber, State Political Correspondent

MELBOURNE, April 13 AAP - The Victorian government was planning to build Australia's first
private juvenile prison on a site north of Melbourne, the state opposition said today.

Despite the warnings of juvenile welfare and legal groups, plans were underway to build a
multi-million dollar facility of at least 75 beds at the site of a former Australian Paper
Mills plant in Broadford, called The Pondage.

Labor community services spokeswoman Christine Campbell said negotiations had been held
between the Shire of Mitchell, the state government and private operators, with Mitchell
Council informed of the plans at a meeting last month.

Ms Campbell asked Minister for Youth and Community Services Denis Napthine in state
parliament today if the project was going ahead, despite the concerns of senior judges, the
Law Institute, the heads of churches and welfare groups that juvenile justice should remain
under government control.

Mr Napthine said a new facility was needed because the existing senior youth training
facility at Malmsbury had an average of 129 inmates a day compared with 62 in 1996/97.

That new facility was now being planned but no decision had been made on where it would be
or who would run it, he said.

An expert committee was examining the issue.

A spokesman from Mitchell Shire was not immediately available for comment.

Labor has threatened to review all private prison contracts in Victoria if it wins
government, citing high suicide and drug use rates in these adult facilities as evidence of
their failure.

Ms Campbell said the government had shown prospective operators around the existing
Malmsbury and Parkville juvenile facilities in February, and a senior member of Dr Napthine's
department had visited the United States last year to investigate private juvenile prison
contracts there.

This bureaucrat had looked at contracts in Texas and Boston.

Ms Campbell said there were 50 beds at the Turana facility in Parkville which were
currently below health standards and should be upgraded.

Privatised juvenile justice was a recipe for crime creation, she said.

All available dollars should be spent on youth in need rather than skimmed off as profit by
private operators, she said.

AAP pjb/ra/jnb

KEYWORD: BROADFORD

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