A sharp increase in the number of children and young people detained in the ACT has led to concerns over a lack of access to education and other programs.
The ACT National Preventive Mechanism conducted inspections of the territory’s Bimberi Youth Justice Centre and flagged potential issues over staffing pressures, incidents of excessive use of force and a lack of trauma-informed approaches.
The youth prison can hold up to 40 people but is staffed to support 21 young people. In April this year, the average daily number of people held at the centre was 27.
The report found that this “significant and sustained increase” in the number of young people in detention has led to issues in the centre upholding the rights and wellbeing of the young people in its care.
“Young people are spending too long in their unit with little to do, which is not good for their mental health and can heighten tension in the centre,” the report said.
“Without active, busy days, young people do not have enough outlets to let off steam, and tensions are likely to fester, heightening safety and security risk.”
The ACT Human Rights Commission has called for workers at the Alexander Maconochie Centre to receive ongoing human rights education and training.
The recommendations came after the ACT Supreme Court found in early September that the human rights of a First Nations woman in the prison had been seriously breached.
The court found that the woman, who had a history of trauma and was in a state of extreme distress after she was denied a request to attend her grandmother’s funeral, had her rights breached through use of force against her, an attempted strip search and an actual strip search.
In response to the court’s findings, the ACT Human Rights Commission called on the ACT Government to immediately implement comprehensive and ongoing human rights training for all workers at the territory’s only prison.
An investigation has found that a First Nations child was kept in solitary confinement for 84 hours and was denied food and medication as a coercion “tactic”.
The report by the NT Office of the Children’s Commissioner revealed that youth justice officers at the Don Dale Youth Detention Centre kept the child in isolation for three and a half days following a riot at the facility early last year.
In an attempt to get the child to move blocks, they then denied him food and medication.
The report found that the boy had pleaded over the intercom for food but was denied.
The commissioner made five recommendations to the NT Government, but three were rejected, including ones relating to food service, administering medication after hours and the detection of weapons.
A number of prison officers have undertaken industrial action for the first time in Northern Territory history.
In mid-September about 45 corrections facility managers began the action in response to the Northern Territory Government’s latest enterprise agreement offer, claiming the government was holding their entitlements “to ransom”.
The industrial action included work stoppages for up to two hours, the banning of on-call work and other protected actions.
The Northern Territory Government also confirmed that work had started on a new women’s sector at the Darwin Correctional Precinct in September.
This new area will be an 88-bed facility and is expected to open by the end of the year.
Western Australia’s three minimum-security prison farms are under significant strain due to the number of people in prison.
The Karnet, Pardelup and Wooroloo prison farms provide pre-release programs and also produce food such as meat, eggs, dairy, fruit and vegetables for prisons around the state.
All three of these prison farms are currently close to being full.
The Office of the Inspector of Custodial Services (OICS) released a report into the prison farms in September, finding that their rehabilitation and reintegration potential was not being maximised due to population pressures, staffing shortages and ongoing delays in treatment assessments.
“Prison farms have historically played a crucial role in preparing individuals for life beyond prison,” OICS Inspector Eamon Ryan said.
“However, they are now facing significant strain due to increasing prisoner numbers, constrained resources and delays in treatment assessments.
“These pressures are limiting the system’s ability to meet prisoner needs and diminishing opportunities for meaningful rehabilitation prior to release.”
The OICS recommended the WA Government take steps to reduce processing delays in assessment and approval of people in prison for external activities and the employment program, but these recommendations were not supported.
The state government has announced a new accelerated training program for people with prior adult custodial experience looking to re-enter the workforce.
It’s part of an effort to bring more prison officers on board and is on top of a regional-based training initiative and new regional financial incentives.
The six-week Accelerated Training Program is half the length of the normal 12-week course and is available to qualified individuals from Australia or New Zealand who hold a Certificate III in Correctional Practice.
Twelve graduates have already completed the shorter training in September.
A class action lawsuit is being planned over conditions in youth detention centres in Queensland.
Law firm Levitt Robinson is preparing a class action on behalf of children who were incarcerated at five detention centres across the state, seeking compensation for those subjected to isolation, poorly kept cells, excessive use of force and a lack of services.
The class action will be on behalf of people held at Cleveland, Brisbane, West Moreton, Sir Leslie Wilson and John Oxley youth detention centres.
It will be for people who were subject to lockdowns due to staffing shortages and who were placed in unhygienic cells with no running water or working toilet.
It will allege that these children did not have access to education, meaningful out-of-cell time and psychosocial supports.
The first people have been incarcerated at the new Lockyer Valley Correctional Centre, west of Brisbane.
The centre has capacity for more than 1,500 people and will eventually have 800 prison officers.
Queensland Corrective Services Commissioner Paul Stewart said the high-security prison was designed with a focus on rehabilitation and that there were no bars on the windows.
“We’ve done things to increase the amount of daylight that prisoners have access to, higher ceilings, better sound, and that’s for prisoners and staff,” Stewart said.
People incarcerated at other prisons in the state will be moved to the new facility, with no timeline for when it will reach close to its full capacity.
A sharp increase in the number of children and young people detained in the ACT has led to concerns over a lack of access to education and other programs.
The ACT National Preventive Mechanism conducted inspections of the territory’s Bimberi Youth Justice Centre and flagged potential issues over staffing pressures, incidents of excessive use of force and a lack of trauma-informed approaches.
The youth prison can hold up to 40 people but is staffed to support 21 young people. In April this year, the average daily number of people held at the centre was 27.
The report found that this “significant and sustained increase” in the number of young people in detention has led to issues in the centre upholding the rights and wellbeing of the young people in its care.
“Young people are spending too long in their unit with little to do, which is not good for their mental health and can heighten tension in the centre,” the report said.
“Without active, busy days, young people do not have enough outlets to let off steam, and tensions are likely to fester, heightening safety and security risk.”
The ACT Human Rights Commission has called for workers at the Alexander Maconochie Centre to receive ongoing human rights education and training.
The recommendations came after the ACT Supreme Court found in early September that the human rights of a First Nations woman in the prison had been seriously breached.
The court found that the woman, who had a history of trauma and was in a state of extreme distress after she was denied a request to attend her grandmother’s funeral, had her rights breached through use of force against her, an attempted strip search and an actual strip search.
In response to the court’s findings, the ACT Human Rights Commission called on the ACT Government to immediately implement comprehensive and ongoing human rights training for all workers at the territory’s only prison.
An investigation has found that a First Nations child was kept in solitary confinement for 84 hours and was denied food and medication as a coercion “tactic”.
The report by the NT Office of the Children’s Commissioner revealed that youth justice officers at the Don Dale Youth Detention Centre kept the child in isolation for three and a half days following a riot at the facility early last year.
In an attempt to get the child to move blocks, they then denied him food and medication.
The report found that the boy had pleaded over the intercom for food but was denied.
The commissioner made five recommendations to the NT Government, but three were rejected, including ones relating to food service, administering medication after hours and the detection of weapons.
A number of prison officers have undertaken industrial action for the first time in Northern Territory history.
In mid-September about 45 corrections facility managers began the action in response to the Northern Territory Government’s latest enterprise agreement offer, claiming the government was holding their entitlements “to ransom”.
The industrial action included work stoppages for up to two hours, the banning of on-call work and other protected actions.
The Northern Territory Government also confirmed that work had started on a new women’s sector at the Darwin Correctional Precinct in September.
This new area will be an 88-bed facility and is expected to open by the end of the year.
Western Australia’s three minimum-security prison farms are under significant strain due to the number of people in prison.
The Karnet, Pardelup and Wooroloo prison farms provide pre-release programs and also produce food such as meat, eggs, dairy, fruit and vegetables for prisons around the state.
All three of these prison farms are currently close to being full.
The Office of the Inspector of Custodial Services (OICS) released a report into the prison farms in September, finding that their rehabilitation and reintegration potential was not being maximised due to population pressures, staffing shortages and ongoing delays in treatment assessments.
“Prison farms have historically played a crucial role in preparing individuals for life beyond prison,” OICS Inspector Eamon Ryan said.
“However, they are now facing significant strain due to increasing prisoner numbers, constrained resources and delays in treatment assessments.
“These pressures are limiting the system’s ability to meet prisoner needs and diminishing opportunities for meaningful rehabilitation prior to release.”
The OICS recommended the WA Government take steps to reduce processing delays in assessment and approval of people in prison for external activities and the employment program, but these recommendations were not supported.
The state government has announced a new accelerated training program for people with prior adult custodial experience looking to re-enter the workforce.
It’s part of an effort to bring more prison officers on board and is on top of a regional-based training initiative and new regional financial incentives.
The six-week Accelerated Training Program is half the length of the normal 12-week course and is available to qualified individuals from Australia or New Zealand who hold a Certificate III in Correctional Practice.
Twelve graduates have already completed the shorter training in September.
A class action lawsuit is being planned over conditions in youth detention centres in Queensland.
Law firm Levitt Robinson is preparing a class action on behalf of children who were incarcerated at five detention centres across the state, seeking compensation for those subjected to isolation, poorly kept cells, excessive use of force and a lack of services.
The class action will be on behalf of people held at Cleveland, Brisbane, West Moreton, Sir Leslie Wilson and John Oxley youth detention centres.
It will be for people who were subject to lockdowns due to staffing shortages and who were placed in unhygienic cells with no running water or working toilet.
It will allege that these children did not have access to education, meaningful out-of-cell time and psychosocial supports.
The first people have been incarcerated at the new Lockyer Valley Correctional Centre, west of Brisbane.
The centre has capacity for more than 1,500 people and will eventually have 800 prison officers.
Queensland Corrective Services Commissioner Paul Stewart said the high-security prison was designed with a focus on rehabilitation and that there were no bars on the windows.
“We’ve done things to increase the amount of daylight that prisoners have access to, higher ceilings, better sound, and that’s for prisoners and staff,” Stewart said.
People incarcerated at other prisons in the state will be moved to the new facility, with no timeline for when it will reach close to its full capacity.
A report into the use of isolation at a South Australian youth detention facility has warned that the regular use of the practice may be in breach of international human rights law.
The investigation, conducted by Training Centre Visitor Shona Reid, found that the use of isolations to manage behaviour was common, with young people locked in their rooms for long periods with reduced access to education, exercise or human connection.
The report found that this may be contrary to the state’s Charter of Rights for Youths Detained in Training Centres and in breach of international law.
“The use of isolation as a routine response to complexity, behavioural risk or staffing constraints undermines the rehabilitative intent of youth detention and reflects a failure to meet required standards of care,” it said.
The investigation found that isolation was being used at the facility without giving thought to a child’s development stage, disability, trauma history or cultural identity.
It called on the state government to make amendments to make sure that all isolation practices are regulated and conform with the law, make improvements to record keeping and invest in non-punitive de-escalation practices.
“Until these changes are enacted, the rights and wellbeing of children in custody remain at risk,” the report said.
More than 100 new beds will be in place in prisons around the state by the end of next year as part of a new prison expansion plan.
The new beds are on top of a new 40-bed facility at Adelaide Women’s Prison, with construction underway.
The 116 new beds will be spread across the state’s prison network, with 32 at Mount Gambier Prison, 50 at Adelaide Remand Centre and 34 at Adelaide Women’s Prison.
The women’s prison will have a total capacity of 326, with the state government also planning to install contraband perimeter fencing and new cameras at the prison.
More than 300 high-security beds are also being built at the Yatala Labour Prison.
A second tranche of bail reforms has been passed by the Victorian Parliament.
The changes will make it harder to receive bail if you are a repeat offender and introduce tougher bail tests for “high-risk offenders”.
There will be new bail tests applied to anyone on bail who is then charged with home invasions, carjackings, armed robberies and aggravated burglaries.
The courts will be ordered to deny bail unless they are satisfied there is a high degree of probability the person will not commit one of these offences if bail were to be granted.
There will also be a tougher bail test for those accused of repeatedly committing crimes such as burglary, car theft, assault, riot and affray, and weapon offences.
The new bail laws were opposed in parliament by the Greens, the Legalise Cannabis Party and the Animal Justice Party.
The Victorian Aboriginal Legal Service said the bail reforms will disproportionately impact First Nations Victorians.
“These dangerous bail laws are a crisis for Aboriginal people who, when charged with offences they have not even been found guilty of, are unable to remain connected to family, community and culture or access support services,” the Victorian Aboriginal Legal Service said in a statement.
A man incarcerated in a NSW prison has accessed the voluntary assisted dying scheme for the first time.
The man, who was diagnosed with terminal cancer after seven years in custody, died in hospital in late August after his application for voluntary assisted dying was approved by Justice Health.
Accessing this scheme is based on set criteria and governed by the NSW Voluntary Assisted Dying Board, which is an independent oversight and decision-making body.
Corrective Services NSW does not play a role in this decision-making process.
Record number of Aboriginal deaths in prison
There were a record number of First Nations deaths in prisons in New South Wales in the last year.
In 2024–25, 10 First Nations people died in prison in NSW, the highest number in the last decade, of a total of 27 deaths in custody.
Four First Nations people died at the Metropolitan Remand and Reception Centre, and two died at Parklea Correctional Centre. The four other deaths in custody occurred in other prisons around the state.
The highest number of First Nations deaths in prison in NSW before this last year was six, in 2019-20.
A visitor to the Risdon prison has been charged with allegedly bringing drugs into the facility during a professional visit with an inmate.
The individual has been charged with two counts of possessing drugs and two counts of unlawfully taking unauthorised articles into a prison.
They were “intercepted” while trying to carry the drugs into the Tasmanian prison in late August, while conducting an “authorised meeting” with a person in the prison.
The woman will appear before the Hobart Magistrates Court at a later date
A report into the use of isolation at a South Australian youth detention facility has warned that the regular use of the practice may be in breach of international human rights law.
The investigation, conducted by Training Centre Visitor Shona Reid, found that the use of isolations to manage behaviour was common, with young people locked in their rooms for long periods with reduced access to education, exercise or human connection.
The report found that this may be contrary to the state’s Charter of Rights for Youths Detained in Training Centres and in breach of international law.
“The use of isolation as a routine response to complexity, behavioural risk or staffing constraints undermines the rehabilitative intent of youth detention and reflects a failure to meet required standards of care,” it said.
The investigation found that isolation was being used at the facility without giving thought to a child’s development stage, disability, trauma history or cultural identity.
It called on the state government to make amendments to make sure that all isolation practices are regulated and conform with the law, make improvements to record keeping and invest in non-punitive de-escalation practices.
“Until these changes are enacted, the rights and wellbeing of children in custody remain at risk,” the report said.
More than 100 new beds will be in place in prisons around the state by the end of next year as part of a new prison expansion plan.
The new beds are on top of a new 40-bed facility at Adelaide Women’s Prison, with construction underway.
The 116 new beds will be spread across the state’s prison network, with 32 at Mount Gambier Prison, 50 at Adelaide Remand Centre and 34 at Adelaide Women’s Prison.
The women’s prison will have a total capacity of 326, with the state government also planning to install contraband perimeter fencing and new cameras at the prison.
More than 300 high-security beds are also being built at the Yatala Labour Prison.
A second tranche of bail reforms has been passed by the Victorian Parliament.
The changes will make it harder to receive bail if you are a repeat offender and introduce tougher bail tests for “high-risk offenders”.
There will be new bail tests applied to anyone on bail who is then charged with home invasions, carjackings, armed robberies and aggravated burglaries.
The courts will be ordered to deny bail unless they are satisfied there is a high degree of probability the person will not commit one of these offences if bail were to be granted.
There will also be a tougher bail test for those accused of repeatedly committing crimes such as burglary, car theft, assault, riot and affray, and weapon offences.
The new bail laws were opposed in parliament by the Greens, the Legalise Cannabis Party and the Animal Justice Party.
The Victorian Aboriginal Legal Service said the bail reforms will disproportionately impact First Nations Victorians.
“These dangerous bail laws are a crisis for Aboriginal people who, when charged with offences they have not even been found guilty of, are unable to remain connected to family, community and culture or access support services,” the Victorian Aboriginal Legal Service said in a statement.
A man incarcerated in a NSW prison has accessed the voluntary assisted dying scheme for the first time.
The man, who was diagnosed with terminal cancer after seven years in custody, died in hospital in late August after his application for voluntary assisted dying was approved by Justice Health.
Accessing this scheme is based on set criteria and governed by the NSW Voluntary Assisted Dying Board, which is an independent oversight and decision-making body.
Corrective Services NSW does not play a role in this decision-making process.
Record number of Aboriginal deaths in prison
There were a record number of First Nations deaths in prisons in New South Wales in the last year.
In 2024–25, 10 First Nations people died in prison in NSW, the highest number in the last decade, of a total of 27 deaths in custody.
Four First Nations people died at the Metropolitan Remand and Reception Centre, and two died at Parklea Correctional Centre. The four other deaths in custody occurred in other prisons around the state.
The highest number of First Nations deaths in prison in NSW before this last year was six, in 2019-20.
A visitor to the Risdon prison has been charged with allegedly bringing drugs into the facility during a professional visit with an inmate.
The individual has been charged with two counts of possessing drugs and two counts of unlawfully taking unauthorised articles into a prison.
They were “intercepted” while trying to carry the drugs into the Tasmanian prison in late August, while conducting an “authorised meeting” with a person in the prison.
The woman will appear before the Hobart Magistrates Court at a later date
Including tough bail laws being introduced in Victoria, the South Australian Government ruling out raising the age of criminal responsibility, a new parole board president appointed in Queensland and more.
The Australian Federal election is coming up. This is about voting for the Prime Minister and other federal politicians. It will be held on 3 May 2025.
“We can’t get information about how a party or candidate’s policies must impact prisoners,” Kelly told About Time. “Prison officers also will not provide us with any information as it is seen as political.”
Prison work differs across the country.
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