PRISONS AND PRISONERS.

Evening Star, Issue 12760, 13 March 1906, Page 7

PRISONS AND PRISONERS.

THE MINISTER'S VIEWS. In his reply to the deputation from the Dunedin Prisons and Industrial Schools Reform Society yesterday afternoon the Hon. J. M'Gowan expressed his views on a number of matters connected'' -with the administration of justice in which proposals for reform hare recently been suggested. As to indeterminate sentences, Mr M'Gowan said that when it was Drought before Parliament he did not look •upon it with a great deal of favor, but he had modified his opinion. 'He was afraid many expected too much from iL He had read some accounts of the system in America, and he did not think the Elmira system had always been the success they were led to beKeve. The Government wished to see if they could not do something in the matter of sentences. If they did something next session, they might do more later on. Payment of prisoners for work done in gaol was another subject touched on. The Minister said that the idea of encouraging prisoners by paying them for their work was very nice, but the department must watch they were not putting the criminal in a better position than the man who had not committed any crime, and who was struggling to keep himself and his family. He thought by going slowly they would be able to effect considerable reform. There was just a line between where they were going to improve the condition of the prisoner and pamper him by making him better off than the man who kept out of gaol and worked hard day by day. Associations like that represented by the deputation could do much when a prisoner came out of gaol in the way of help which was outside the province of the Department of Justice. Once prisoners served their sentence they had to let them go with the small sum of money they had earned, and that was, he felt, a time when a prisoner required someone to look after him, and the Prisoners' Aid Societies had done more good than the public knew of in this way. A3 to the view expressed earlier by one of the deputation that the gaols in the four large centres should be done away with, the Minister agreed that the ideal prison should be out of the way altogether in a country place, taking up 5,000 or 6,000 acres of land; but they must recollect that relatives would sometimes want to see prisoners, and they could not travel back and forwards for that purpose.' It might be good for the prisoners, but bad for their friends. They would have to deal with, prisons as they were, and do the best they could under existing conditions. The idea of a special officer to look after these people was not a bad one, but he did not think that officer should be a State officer. Mr M'Gowan said in regard to youthful offenders that it was quite true instructions or suggestions had been sent out to the magistrates, and meantime it was intended to bring in a Bill dealing with these cases. He thought such proposals could be brought down as would meet with the approval" of the House, and would meet the case of juvenile offenders. The suggested practice of not recording the name was rather a dangerous one. Records were wanted, but it would be possible after a certain number of years to erase the name. If the name were only recorded after a second offence, as suggested, there would be no record to show there had heen two previous offences.