Kerre Woodham: Prisons are evidence of failure, but what's the alternative?

Prisons to me are tangible evidence of failure. Failure of a person to do the right thing, failure of family, of community, of society. Before they've even been used, they smell like failure. I’ve emceed a fundraiser for the Shine domestic violence prevention charity at Mount Eden's remand prison before the first prisoner had stepped foot inside it. And even though it was brand-spanking new and done to the very best of the budget and to the specs, you just felt like failure the moment you walked in there.

It would be so much better to spend the 150K per year that we spend on average on each prisoner, on at-risk kids to prevent them becoming just another statistic, perpetuating the cycle. But prisons are a necessary evil because some people do evil things. And because if people aren't seen to be punished for doing evil things, society's fragile contract breaks down.

Remember the case of the 26 year old drunk who had been reported for dangerous driving? As he went from point A to point B, from his work drinks to a mate's house to drink more while throwing back premixed drinks in his car, he slammed into the vehicle of an innocent young woman, killing her. Jake Hamlin got 12 months home detention, 200 hours community work, disqualified from driving for a year, and ordered to pay $8k in reparation. And that just doesn't seem enough. But because you and I want to see a life mean something, we want to see that when you recklessly take the life of another person, you have to pay for that. And you have to be seen to pay for that. And the payment has to be significant. You've taken another person's life. A person with hope and dreams and potential and family who loved her. And what? You sit at home for 12 months? So because I want to see him punished, we need more prisons.

Our prison population looks set to increase by more than 30% in the next decade. I think we'll be lucky if we can keep it at 30%. Given the social issues over the past five years, it will be bloody lucky if we can keep it at 30%. And because we can't build prisons fast enough, that may well lead to double bunking, which will lead to more issues, and so on and so forth. The previous National government had planned to build more prisons, but Labour put the kibosh on that. They decided they would depopulate prisons. A policy that didn't work so well, as Corrections Minister Mark Mitchell told Ryan Bridge this morning:

“I think that we've been really clear that we are focused on public safety, and under the previous government, the only target they had around public safety was reducing the prison population by 30%, and we saw a massive increase in violent crime. So there are some people that don't want to stick to the rules that think they're above the, above the law, that are often recidivist violent offenders, and the safest place to put them is into a correction system or facility where then we can start to work on rehabilitation and hope that they rejoin society and make good decisions in their lives. There's a huge human cost and economic cost to having these people in the community and we've been very clear as a government that we're not going to tolerate that.”

Yeah, I like his optimistic approach that there can be rehabilitation, and people can re-enter society when for a very long time, these people have been on the outer of society. They don't want to join society because that means they'd have to get a job, and turn up on time, and not sell drugs. Mark Mitchell said after year-on-year increases in violent crime since 2018, it was encouraging to see a reversal of that, with a 2% drop in numbers for 2024. He said violent crime increased by 51% between 2018 and 2023.

So in October of last year, the prison population broke the 10,000 mark for the first time, and inmate numbers are expected to reach nearly 14,000 in the next decade. And that means we need more prisons. But even as Waikeria and Christchurch have begun expansion at their prisons, you've got a hikoi, organised by People Against Prisons Aotearoa, marching on Parliament.

What on Earth do they expect people to do? What is the alternative? What do the Tamatha Pauls and the People Against Prisons Aotearoa want to have happened to somebody like Jake Hamlin? Or somebody who so violently assaults his partner, the mother of his children that she either ends up dead, or with life changing injuries? What do they expect to have happen then? What do you expect when somebody coward punches? Or when somebody is making an absolute fortune by selling drugs and perpetuating misery? Getting young people hooked on drugs so that they've got more customers? Or when some sleazy ass uses their privilege —this has been the case recently— to rob people blind, to abuse their trust, wreck their companies, destroy livelihoods? What do they expect? That they're going to sit at home for a year? I know that I know that prisons represent failure. But not locking up people is an even bigger failure.

Kerre McIvor, is a journalist, radio presenter, author and columnist. Currently hosts the Kerre Woodham mornings show on Newstalk ZB - where this article was sourced.