$165m For Boost In Jails
Sun Herald
Sunday September 2, 2001
A new jail will be built in western NSW and Cooma jail will be reopened to cope with the State's soaring prison population.
Premier Bob Carr yesterday announced the $165million creation of 1,805 new places in the prison system as offenders are being given tougher sentences.
Figures just released show the State's prison population has grown more than 20 per cent in six years and will increase by another 15pc by 2005.
Speaking at Goulburn Police Academy a day after announcing new anti-gang measures, Mr Carr said: ``It is simple. If there are violent criminals in prison, then our streets are safer. With that in mind, I make no apology for prison numbers rising sharply in NSW."
The need for extra prison places was due to more and longer custodial sentences, fewer defendants being granted bail, increased police numbers and offenders who breach periodic detention orders being sent to jail, he said.
Mr Carr and Corrective Services Minister John Watkins will visit Cooma today to announce the reopening of the jail which the Government closed in June 1998.
By the end of this year, Cooma jail, opened in 1876 and last used as a specialist jail for pedophiles and other sex offenders, will be renovated and ready to house 140 remand prisoners.
Mr Carr will also announce the allocation of $2 million to plan a new 350- place jail in the central west at a location to be decided. It will open by 2005.
His Cooma and western NSW jail plans are in addition to new jails to be built at South Windsor and Kempsey at a cost of more than $100 million to provide a total of 550 prison places.
Since 1995-96, the prison population has risen 21.3pc from 6,424 inmates to 7,794. On conservative estimates, the number will rise to 9,000 by 2005.
Under Mr Carr's plan, Berrima jail in the southern highlands will be converted at a cost of $800,000 to house 60 long-term women prisoners. This will relieve pressure on the main NSW women's prison, Mulawa, at Silverwater, which is severely overcrowded.
Meanwhile, the Government is searching for a replacement for NSW Corrective Services Commissioner Leo Keliher.
He will quit in November to become director-general of the Queensland Department of Premier and Cabinet, the most powerful position in Premier Peter Beattie's Public Service.
BREAD AND MORTAR
* NSW prison system to have 1,805 new places.
* New jail in central west for 350 prisoners.
* Jails built at South Windsor and Kempsey.
* Cooma jail to bere-opened to house 140 remand inmates.
* Berrima jail to be converted at a cost of $800,000 to house 60 long-term women prisoners, relieving pressure on Sydney's Mulawa prison.
* Twelve other jails expanded.
© 2001 Sun Herald
