Its few pot plants are wilting, but you can see a clear blue sky. While the security cameras and the guards are still watching, detainees are less worried about being overheard. This is as far as the visitor gets. For descriptions of life in the rest of the centre, The Sunday Age has to rely on several first-hand accounts from inmates, backed up by a Human Rights Commission report, a parliamentary committee report and the newly released Ombudsman's report. Together they build a picture of a bleak, overcrowded and tense institution, with little privacy.
Single men sleep in four-bunk rooms with no doors, as do single women.
Only family rooms have doors. They say that bread, the day before Christmas, had mould on it. Fruit is often rotten. Lunches and dinners comprise rice topped with a mess of chicken or mince or other unidentifiable meat. Afterwards, detainees are scanned with metal detectors for stolen cutlery.