The real cost of more prisons

According to the government's "Major Projects" webpage, the new prisons to be built in South Australia will cost $438 million!! The prison capacity, according to that website, will increase by about 500.

The ABS puts the annual cost of keeping a prisoner at $58,000, or a massive $29 million every year to house 500 extra prisoners.

Since there appears to be no plan to increase the size of the remand centre, we also need to factor in the cost of transporting all the remand prisoners from Murray Bridge to the city for Court appearances.

If Victoria can have the lowest crime rate in Australia, and an imprisonment rate of less than three quarters that in SA, what does our Government propose to do to reduce crime?

Police Commissioner Mal Hyde Agrees with Simon Slade

Sorry about the silly headline, but I could not resist. Would love to see that in The Advertiser one day.

Last Friday night, on ABC's Stateline, Commissioner Hyde made the same point that I have been making about the so-called Gang of 49: "It's not exactly a gang of 49. They're a particular targeted group of people. They're not all associated together and it's not formed like a tightly knit gang. They're just a group of associated high risk offenders."

It was also interesting to see the Commissioner's views on rehabilitation, given the different way that those views were represented in some print media.

Either we take the bull by the horns and commit to rehabilitation, or we sentence our society to a future of increased crime.

DNA tests for minor offences

The government has announced plans to DNA test people charged with summary offences that do not attract an expiation notice.

There are already long delays for DNA work in criminal matters, with some cases being adjourned for months awaiting the results.

If the government is serious about this policy, there will need to be a lot more funding for the Forensic Science Centre, so they can keep up with the workload.

Changes to Rape Trials

In the Advertiser today, it was reported that the government is to bring in changes to the laws about the way rape trials are conducted.

If the report in the paper is accurate, then the "changes" do not seem to be any great departure from the legal position at the moment, and seem to be just another opportunity to have a go at lawyers.

Apparently the government is concerned about the low conviction rate for these offences, and once again, it is the defence lawyers who are apparently to blame. Perhaps they should spend a little bit of time somewhere near a courtroom, before passing sentence on those of us who stand as the guardians of the rights of every citizen, particularly at the low rates that the under-funded legal aid system offers to defence lawyers.

The gang of 49

Now that some of the media hype has died down, we can examine this a little more closely.

The idea that these people are a gang is a myth. There is no organised structure, and there is no one person or group that is co-ordination the activities of these people. Just a group of people, loosely connected by family relationships, who are committing crimes. The media has done little to examine why this is the case, or suggest any solutions beyond locking them up.

While people may need to be punished for committing crime, unless the root cause of the criminal behaviour is addressed, the crime will continue.