Oral Submission to the Law and Order Select Committee on the Corrections Amendment Bill 2011

Kim Workman
Director
Rethinking Crime and Punishment

23rd May 2012

Thank you for the opportunity to speak on the Robson Hanan Trust’s submission.

In the introduction to our written submission, we expressed concern at the piece meal approach to criminal justice legislation. The effect of that has been to change the ways prisons are run, and to dilute prisoners’ rights in the process. We urge the government to take a more strategic, rounded and justice centred approach to prison management.

Earlier this week, the Minister of Corrections announced one of the most ambitious strategies for offender rehabilitation and reintegration in the last twenty years. It is a comprehensive strategy which increases rehabilitation, education and training in prisons, increases community support for rehabilitation, and increases partnership with iwi and community. Drug treatment both in prisons and the community will increase by 500-%, rehabilitation by 230%, and work and education in prison by 30%.

Our focus today is on the part of the strategy that relates to prisoner rehabilitation, and whether this Bill will ensure that the portion of the budget spent in the prison rehabilitation , will provide a return on investment.

The idea that large scale rehabilitation can work in prison has little currency. Professor Andrew Coyle, recently retired Professor of Prison Studies, King College, and a Prison Governor of many years’ experience, put it this way:

“There is also another dangerous influence at work and that is the proposition advanced by some people who work in and around the prison system that good can come out of imprisonment; that it can be an important method of changing the behaviour and attitude of those who are sent there, so that they will come out better people and much less likely to commit crime as a result of their experiences in prison”. (1)

The Department of Corrections in its own publication acknowledges that community-based programmes generate better outcomes than custodial programmes with community programmes generating results double those of prison based programmes. (2)

Nils Christie, the Norwegian criminologist suggest s that there may be another motive. “Study after study has shown how penal measures and long-term incarceration have been made more acceptable to society if they were disguised as treatment, training, or pure help to suffering individuals in need of such measures. “(3)

Notwithstanding, there is some evidence that rehabilitation can succeed in prison if it is delivered by the right people, at the right time, under the right conditions and with the right support. In short, it requires a massive culture shift within the prison system for rehabilitation to succeed, a point already acknowledged by the Minister and Corrections leaders.

For rehabilitation to succeed it requires staff and participants to act in support of treatment goals, encouraging and rewarding treatment related progress, and building positive relationships (4) It requires staff to shift their thinking so that prisoners are no longer regarded as “offenders in need of punishment but clients in need of support ”.(5)

The question we ask is this – does this Corrections Amendment Bill contribute to the culture change needed to ensure that the funding committed to prisoner rehabilitation will provide value for money? What effect wills the dilution of prisoner’s basic rights have on their response to rehabilitation.

In my own experience, it is nigh impossible to motivate a prisoner to plan toward transformational change, when he is distracted by pain from an ulcerated mouth, and a persistent toothache – ignored by the prison nurse, sometimes under coercion from custodial staff. Nor is it possible to encourage a prisoner toward non-violent behaviour, when he has been subjected to yet another unnecessary strip search, because his mouth has put him offside with prison officers.

In our view, this is a classic case of the government’s policy moving in one direction, and proposed legislation moving in another. The investment in prisoner rehabilitation will not yield a return unless there is an equal investment in bedding in culture change – and legislation plays an important part in that.

Rethinking’s primary concern with this Bill is the inappropriate delegation of authority to allow decisions affecting the basic human rights and decent of prisoners to be made by prison staff. In our view, the level of delegation envisaged by the Bill is not in line with modern Corrections practice, and jeopardises the requirement to provide an acceptable standard of humane containment. The delegation of authority from prison managers and independent health professionals, to staff at a low level in the organisation; will do nothing to encourage the culture change that is essential to the effective provision of rehabilitation in prisons.

The department’s Kaupapa statement should be our focus of attention - “Kotahi ano te kaupapa; ko te oranga o te iwi” - There is only one purpose to our work; it is the wellness and wellbeing of the people.”

I suggest that there is further work to be done. It is around developing a set of values that return to fundamentals – a humane, just and workable prison system that attempts to reduce the pain of imprisonment for those under our care. As Florence Nightingale famously argued, the first principle of the hospital should be to do the sick no harm. If the focus can shift from managing risk to supporting humans to achieve their best, that will be a major achievement.

References

(1) Alison Liebling and Shadd Maruna, ‘The Effects of Imprisonment’, in Foreword by Andrew Coyle, (Willan Publishing, Devon, 2005) xix
(2) Department of Corrections ‘What Works Now? A review and update of research evidence relevant to offender rehabilitation practises within the Department of Corrections, (December 2009) p.48
(3) Nils Christie ‘Prisons in Society or Society as Pr5isoner’, in J. Freeman (ed.) Prisons, Past and Future. London: Heinemann.
(4) Ross, E., Polaschek, D. & Ward, T. (2008). The therapeutic alliance: A theoretical revision for offender rehabilitation, Aggression and Violent Behaviour, 13, 462-480.
(5) Nelson, M., Herlihy, B. & Oescher, J. (2002). A survey of counsellor attitudes towards sex offenders, Journal of Mental Health Counselling, 24.1, 51-67.

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