Ryall Tony: Corrections Bill — Instruction to Committee In Committee Procedure 
Ryall Tony: Corrections Bill — Instruction to Committee In Committee Procedure 
[Volume:617;Page:13033] 
Hon TONY RYALL (National—Bay of Plenty) 
: 
 The National Party Opposition remains firmly opposed to the transitional provisions in Part 3 not the least because it perpetuates the ridiculous ideological stance this Government is taking on the private prison contract to manage the Auckland Central Remand Prison. 
This is an appropriate time to draw members’ attention to the regulatory impact and compliance cost statement that features on page 18 of the commentary on this 150-odd page bill. In summing up the benefits and costs of this proposal I share with members what that Minister was never prepared to take a call on and admit but is prepared to state in the commentary. He did not take one call to confirm the following statement: “It is likely that there will be transitional costs at the end of the contract period” and that is referring to the Australasian Correctional Management contract. He then states: “It is also possible that the ongoing costs of these services to the Department of Corrections will exceed both the level of the funding transfers that occurred at the beginning of the contract and the level of payment to the contracted provider.” 
Government members would not admit in this debate that the Government’s decision to cancel the private contract to manage the Auckland Central Remand Prison will cost the taxpayer plenty. As we heard earlier it costs $43000 a year to keep an inmate in the Auckland Central Remand Prison and $54000 a year for the equivalent inmate in the public prison service. This bill is solely about ideology; nothing more. There is no good reason for making this change other than that the Labour Party made some sort of commitment to the public in 1999 to get tough on crime and the causes of crime. This Government has not kept that promise so why is it bothering to try to do something about these transitional provisions? 
Let us look at clause 206 dealing with the provision of escort services courtroom custodial services or both. We have the remarkable situation where the Government is saying the private sector cannot manage prisons because the private sector should not be allowed coercive powers over individuals in the prison. Yet clause 206 recognises that the Government is prepared to give those coercive powers to the private sector to transport prisoners between courthouses and prisons. So it is all right for the private sector to have those coercive powers while prisoners are transported in a van to the prison but it is not all right to have those coercive powers once prisonersare on the other side of the prison gate. So it is all right for the private sector to control prisoners in a van but it is not all right for the private sector to control prisoners in a prison. What complete ridiculousness and that is what this bill is all about. 
Throughout the Committee stage the Opposition asked the Minister to take a call and explain why his Government is giving away this opportunity to have significant amounts of money to spend elsewhere in the corrections sector; to explain some of the foolish proposals—such as putting the integrated offender management system in legislation legislating about how many times prisoners’ sheets will be washed legislating about what sort of food prisoners will eat legislating about whether prisoners can send letters and how much exercise they should get. Those things should not be in the law; they should be in the regulations. 
We still have not heard from the Minister about the litigation risk of the new rights for prisoners as proposed in the bill.