Davis KelvinCORRECTIONS AMENDMENT BILLIn CommitteePart 1 Amendments to principal ActHon KELVIN DAVIS (Minister of Corrections): It gives me great pleasure to talk about the Corrections Amendment Bill and I'll just go through a number of the provisions in it.There's a provision regarding prisoners vulnerable to self-harm. At present when a prisoner leaves their cell and comes back to it there's a provision in the current law that that person must be strip-searched. Now we have concern for those people who may have mental health issues—the regularity of them being strip-searched. We propose instead that the person coming back will only be strip-searched based on their individual management plan.There's another provision around mother and baby placements where mothers in the past may have had their baby who was in prison with them actually taken off them and the mother had no right or no grounds or no ability really to have that decision re-examined. So now what we're saying is that mothers need to be given the reasons why their baby would be removed from them and also the process necessary for that decision to be reconsidered. There is also the use of mechanical restraints during hospital visits. We're saying that for restraints to be used for more than 24 hours it must be only if there is a concern that the person may escape rather than them having the restraints on all of the time. When prisoners come into prison it's necessary for them we believe to have information given to them in a form and in the language that they understand so that they can actually understand the information that is given to them. Understanding that not everybody can read any information given to them must be given in a way that they do understand if they are unable to read. So we say that it should be in a form that is accessible and appropriate to the person's abilities and language. There was some discussion around the use of police cells. Now the previous Government wanted us to say that police cells could be used—designated—as corrections cells. The truth of the matter is that with the success that we've had in safely reducing the prison population this provision is no longer necessary. When we became Government the prison population was up around 10500. That was in late 2017. The prison population continued to rise until March 2018 when it reached 10820. Since then we've had a 7 percent prison population reduction which means that it's hovering now around 10000. The prison population is around about 10000. Now the justice sector forecast in 2017 said that if the previous Government had been still in Government in October 2019 the prison population would now be around about 12000. And I can see why the previous Government decided that they needed to have as much extra space as possible and so they decided that prison cells would be one way to have extra accommodation. That is no longer necessary. We have safely reduced the prison population down to like I say hovering around 10000. I did note as I walked into the House this afternoon that the National speaker in the general debate was saying that there are more bad people out there than ever before. The reality is when we became Government the prison population was around 10500 and the number of offenders in the community was 30137. The latest information I have is that the number of offenders in the community is now 29031 which is about 1100 fewer offenders in the community than when we became Government and there's about 500 fewer people in prison than when we became Government. So there are actually fewer offenders in the country; not as I heard when I walked in that there are actually more.Hon Dr Nick Smith: Just rubbish.Hon KELVIN DAVIS: So I hear the Hon Dr Nick Smith praising me for the work that we've done in the corrections field over the last four years—something that he knows that his Government never intended to ever address. In fact they saw the justice sector forecast of 12000 by October 2019 as a target. So the previous Government saw the justice sector forecast as a target and they were just going to build more and more prisons—American-style mega-prisons—to cater for the numbers that they were going to incarcerate.Hon Dr Nick Smith: Just garbage. Nobody believes that. It's about as credible as your nine years of neglect.Hon KELVIN DAVIS: And I continue to hear the acclamation and the affirmation from the Opposition as to the wonderful work that this Government has done to reduce the prison population safely to reduce the number of offenders in the community safely—Chris Bishop: How much has it gone down by?Hon KELVIN DAVIS: How much has it gone down by? I'll just repeat those figures. At the end of 2017 there were 10550 people in prison. There are now 10052—a reduction of 500. In the community there were 30137 at the end of 2017. There's now 29031—a reduction of over a thousand. And what is even more interesting is the work that we've been doing in terms of the total number of sentenced prisoners. At the end of 2017 there were 7529 sentenced prisoners in total. The latest information we have is total sentenced prisoners: 6418. Just quickly doing the maths—over a thousand fewer sentenced prisoners. So this Government is doing a fantastic job in safely reducing the prison population.I recall in the previous debates there was some concern around the sharing of cells and I recalled the Dr the Hon or the Hon Dr—the totally Doctorable Nick Smith—CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): Order! You must use the correct honorific and the correct name for members.Hon KELVIN DAVIS: —the Hon Dr Nick Smith criticising me for saying in Opposition that we shouldn't use shared cells and that now—I think his words were A lion in Opposition and a lamb in Government." Well the reality is that the previous Government knew that there was some legal ambiguity around the use of shared cells and that legal ambiguity in a worst-case scenario—a challenge in court to current practice—could result in a court decision requiring the Department of Corrections to reduce the use of cell sharing which would increase the pressure on available accommodation and impose substantial costs to the Crown.So it's interesting that the previous Government allowed for—because they knew for about four years that there was some risk to the Crown. And I wonder why they didn't do anything about it at the time. And there was four Corrections Ministers in the previous Government. Any one of those four could have done something about it and they didn't. And they left the Crown the Government at some substantial risk and that for me is unacceptable and I can hear the praise from the other side! They just said "Thank you Minister Davis for removing that risk to the Crown and saving us the potential of getting had up for the cell sharing."The reality is if the previous Government had stayed in Government—and remember our prison population was around about 10000 and was forecast to be up to 12000 by now if they were still in—Hon Dr Nick Smith: Fantasy.Hon KELVIN DAVIS: Well he's saying that the justice sector forecast was a fantasy. That's interesting—it was the justice sector forecast when he was in Government. But the reality is we don't have the capacity to house those 12000 people and I don't know where the previous Government would have held them—probably billeted them out around the community. That was probably their only option or they would have had to double-bunk them. Now if they'd double-bunked those extra 2000 people that means in total 2000 people going into cells with other people. That means there'd be 4000 more people being double-bunked right now if the Opposition was still in Government and that is totally unacceptable.So instead of just talking about it we've done something to actually reduce the pressure on the double-bunking. We have safely reduced the prison population. We've safely reduced the number of offenders in the community. This Government is doing a fantastic job in the area of corrections.But let me just come back to this particular bill because I know that they'll go on about the mail system. Hon Mark Mitchell: Mr Chair. CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): Before I give the Hon Mark Mitchell the call I'm just going to make a ruling. I'm going to take the Minister's contribution as opening remarks and I'm going to give the Opposition the opportunity to respond. After that I expect all members to speak to Part 1 of this bill and only to Part 1. The Hon Mark Mitchell."