Women’s Prison At Paparua

Press, Volume CX, Issue 32349, 15 July 1970, Page 1

Women’s Prison At Paparua

Cabinet has approved; the calling of tenders fori a women’s prison, to; accommodate 60, at Paparua Prison and tenders would be called very soon, said the Secretary for Justice (Mr E. A. Missen) in a telephone interview yesterday.

He said the Justice Department would soon be seeking Cabinet approval for the calling of tenders for a new

i medium-security men’s wing; at Paparua Prison, to accomImodate 84. | Women comprise only 3 per cent of New Zealand’s prison population, but the women’s gaol at Dunedin was described by an English authority on penal matters. Mr C. H. Rolph, as a “shocking place” two years ago. The new. self-contained women’s unit at Paparua, a mile from the men’s block, will be the most modern of i its type and the first in New I Zealand to be designed specifically for women. It will include a remand

section, punishment block, and maximum, medium and minimum security wings. There will be two courtyard gardens and each section will have its own exercise yard. Day rooms will be in all wings except the punishment block.

Mr Missen said the new men’s wing at Paparua was urgently required because there was a n tional shortage of accommodation for medium-security prisoners. The Paparua Prison was built to accommodate 150 prisoners, but the average number of prisoners there

over the last two years has been about 230. A Press Association message says that New Plymouth’s medium-security prison is overcrowded to the point that it is impossible to keep all remand prisoners in completely secured accommodation.

The cramped conditions at the prison have meant • that as many as eight prisoners have to be held in the New Plymouth Central Police Station cells. The Wanganui Prison is also overcrowded.