STATEMENTS DISPUTED.

Auckland Star, Volume LXIV, Issue 135, 10 June 1933, Page 14

STATEMENTS DISPUTED.

N.Z. PRISON CONDITIONS.

Complaints that the Prisons Department has published information which was not accurate were made to the Minister of Justice, the Hon. J. G. Cobbe, by Mr. C. E. N. Mackie during the course of an interview with the Minister (states the "Christchurch Times"). Some time ago, said Mr. Mackie, the head of an English Borstal institution, Mr. Jt Weldon, visited New.Zealand ami inspected the New Zealand institutions. In an article in the "Empire Review," Mr. Weklon had stated that 72.0 per cent of New Zealand prisoners became honest and happy citizens. This statement was published in New Zealand newspapers with the official imprimatur of the Prisons Department. Jt was obvious, said Mr. Mackie, that the Department did not have a staff sufficiently large to look after all the., prisoners discharged every year. From 1911 to 1929 approximately 45,000 prisoners had been released in the Dominion. Actually GO per cent of the men in gaol were reeidivifite, and he objected to incorrect

statements being issued by the Prisons Department. .. .',,.•. Replying, the Minister said that r.e had a long interview with Mr. Weldon, who was a Rhodes scholar and who had made a complete study of the question, lie had interrogated Mr. Weldon at length and was satisfied with his statements. That gentleman had travelled through New Zealand unaccompanied and had made a careful examination of the New Zealand system.