Alice Springs Correctional Centre conditions described as 'inhumane'

ABC NEWS (Australia)

An Alice Springs corrections officer says overcrowding, no air conditioning and staff shortages are putting staff and prisoners at risk. Church leaders wrote to the member for Braitling, Josh Burgoyne, raising concerns about the overcrowding and lack of cooling at the prison in March.

Transcript

00:00inhumane with the potential to kill that's how a group of churches doing weekly outreach at the

00:09Alice Springs Correctional Centre have described its hot and overcrowded conditions in a letter

00:15sent in March to Breitling MP Josh Burgoyne after a run of hot days the church has called

00:20for better cooling and ventilation inside the prison ahead of summer but Mr Burgoyne says he

00:26never received their letter and that the cost to air-condition the jail would be twenty million

00:30dollars but if what you're telling me is that the conditions out of the jail mean that people do

00:35not want to go back out there I think that's a positive thing we do not want people to continue

00:40to re-offend and end up in our prisons one signatory to the letter says after meeting Mr Burgoyne

00:46they're still concerned conditions like heat stress cold stress they can't be viewed as additional

00:52punishment so the lines that have been used that if they don't want those conditions they

00:56shouldn't offend I find horrific and inhumane this is not what we ask our government to do a prison

01:02guard who's spoken to the ABC on the condition of anonymity says heat isn't the only issue putting

01:07the lives of staff and prisoners at risk they'd seen 17 people in a cell described conditions as

01:13inhumane in a place supposed to be for rehabilitation they were surprised not to see more serious injury

01:19more often the NT government says an assessment of ventilation found the need for upgrades to

01:25electrical supply claiming they have started the process of seeking contractors as we all know

01:30the heat gets quite bad over in Alice Springs at this time and nothing has been done to mitigate the

01:37risk of the heat for officers and for prisoners a long summer ahead

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