H—2o
1946 NEW ZEALAND
PRISONS (REPORT ON) FOR THE YEAR 1945-46
Presented to both Houses of the General Assembly by Command of His' Excellency
The Hon. the Minister of Justice to His Excellency the GovernorGeneral. Wellington, Bth August, 1946. I have the honour to submit to Your Excellency the report of the ControllerGeneral on the prisons and Borstal institutions of the Dominion for the year 1945-46. I have, &c., F. Jones, for the Minister of Justice. The Controller-General of Prisons to the Hon. the Minister of Justice. I have the honour to present the annual report for the Prisons Department for the financial year ended, 31st March, 1946, showing also the criminal statistics for the year ending 31st December, 1945. Attached hereto are the reports of the officers controlling the various prisons and Borstal institutions. These reports outline the various activities carried on and the programme instituted with a view to giving effect to a reclamative policy. The work at the various institutions, in addition to being of general benefit, is reformative, in that it is designed to conduce to selfesteem and habits of industry among the prisoners by reason of it being of definite economic worth in addition to providing practical vocational training. STATISTICS Last year, due to a shortage of staff in the Statistician's Office, it was not found practicable to produce in my report the customary statistics relating to the nationality and age-groups of offenders. This year these statistics are available, and I set out hereunder the comparative tables for a number of years. It is interesting to note that the aggregate number of commitments to prison and the number of distinct persons dealt with have declined substantially as compared with the numbers handled during the war years, when the prison population was augmented by military offenders and military defaulters, the majority of whom have now been released. The most satisfactory feature of the statistics is the fact that the ratio of distinct persons committed to prison to the general population is less than the figure for last year, thus maintaining the general downward trend of our prison population. The following