Prison report given Chch Anglican support

Press, 6 October 1989, Page 5

Prison report given Chch Anglican support

By

PATRICK McLENNAN

The Synod of the Anglican Diocese of Christchurch has expressed strong support for Sir Clinton Roper’s report in prison management and reform. It urged the Church to take action on it because the Government had not. Synod members meeting in Christchurch this week overwhelmingly supported a motion which urged the establishment of a national series of habilitation centres similiar to Christchurch’s Odyssey and Salisbury houses.

A Christchurch City Mission chaplain, the Rev. Tony Church, said 3700 people were imprisoned

in New Zealand. That was expected to increase to 5500 within three years. He supported comments by a District Court judge that the court industry was one of the country’s major growth industries. New Zealand prisons cost the country $lOB million a year, but were completely unsuccessful in rehabilitating offenders, said Mr Church. “Prisons. Do they work? It’s obvious they don’t.” Habilitation centres, where offenders voluntered to deal with their problems within community bases, cost less than $16,000 a prisoner a year, Mr Church said.

In contrast, a prisoner held in Paremoremo cost $56,000 a year, and one in Christchurch Women’s Prison cost $45,000. The problem of rehabilitation had not been adequately addressed by the New Zealand justice system, he said.

“Most criminals I see coming back into cells in court are in a worse state than they were when they came in.” Habilitation centres were not “soft options”

and offenders were held accountable for their actions while in them. That needed to be underscored, Mr Church said.

A Christchurch prison chaplain, the Rev. Howard Pilgrim, said New Zealand was probably the most imprisoned country in the world.

He said the. Church has to push for Sir Clinton’s recommended reforms. The Govemement had failed to because it would be “political suicide.” People were imprisoned far too easily in New Zealand, and statistics showed that 40 per cent of those imprisoned were serving sentences for minor crimes like non-payment of fines, driving while disqualified and theft.

Mr Pilgrim urged synod members to educate their people on the creative opportunities habilitation and alternative forms of justice would offer offenders.

The Synod decided to establish a working party to investigate how the Church could initiate and support the establishment of habilitation centres.