So.
600 extra prisoners in prison eh?
Jail population grows by 600, Corrections recruitment lags
Prisoner numbers have jumped by nearly 600 while a staffing shortage – which forced the removal of some women prisoners out of Wellington – shows no sign of easing.
Well, the Get Tough On Crime Cheerleaders have swayed the debate and seen more people locked up, but what is the real cost of getting played by the mainstream media crime porn clickbait?
The cost of locking a prisoner up for a year is now a staggering $150 000, 600 extra prisoners is $90 million each year!
$90 million fucking dollars each year!
Who amongst you can pretend locking 600 extra prisoners up for $90million extra a year is a solution?
Imagine if we had spent a mere 10% of that, $9million on just healing these damaged men?
Don’t forget that 70% of those with previous convictions reoffend within 2 years of being released.
That’s right, our prison system is so violent, damaging and degrading that the men come out more damaged than when they went in.
Our total refusal to think beyond punishment and suffering means we have built a counter productive prison industry that only manages to create monsters out of damaged violent men.
Despite violent crime dropping, we are so emotionally manipulated by mainstream media crime porn clickbait and get tough on crime politicians that we prefer a system of punishment and suffering that makes things worse.
Good on ya Kiwis, your ability to be emotionally manipulated is remarkable you muppets.
Increasingly having independent opinion in a mainstream media environment which mostly echo one another has become more important than ever, so if you value having an independent voice – please donate here.
If you can’t contribute but want to help, please always feel free to share our blogs on social media
Umm – let’s see what they are in for before jumping the gun. Given our soft judicial system they must have committed some serious crimes.
The relevant quote in the Herald article:
“Corrections Association President Floyd du Plessis said he “completely disagrees” with the approach, and suggests Davis was “playing the political game”.
“The only thing he keeps mentioning every single time is prison population … that’s his one measure of success.”
“Unfortunately, if offending in the community has gone up, and violence in prisons has skyrocketed, clearly you haven’t improved anything,” he said.
In other words – another Labour policy failure.
Small price to pay for keeping them off the streets. We could save by reducing the bureaucrats and counsellors and social workers they seem to need.
So criminals we need, counsellors and social workers notso much…mmmmm?
That’s not what I said.
It’s what you implied.
A small price to pay for keeping them off the streets. We could save by reducing the numbers of bureaucrats and counsellors they seem to need.
Corrections Association industrial officer Alan Whitley said the single-biggest recruitment tool that was needed was better pay. He knew of a Taupō cleaning job that paid more than a new prison officer.
It would be at least two or three years, and only with better pay, that the staffing issue would be fixed.
Will National be willing to pay more to enable them to lock up more?
And of course, a higher rate of pay will further drive up the cost of incarceration.
I am a conservative Christian but I fully support Martyn on this issue. Obviously, there are people that need to be locked up but the evidence is clear that people can come out of prison worse than when they were convicted so alternatives to prison need to be used as well.
There was an article in the Herald a few years ago stating that a single P addict caused $300,000 of crime a year.
So half that to lock him up seems a bargain.
But surely a better approach is to make P available on prescription, so no crime is required to obtain it?
“Despite violent crime dropping….”
You have the statistics to back that up?
Other sources tell a different story:
https://www.kiwiblog.co.nz/2022/12/violent_offending_stats.html
Yep its from a right wing website, but do you have stats that counter theirs?
Apparently theres a backlog of remand due to violent potentially guilty folks pleading not guilty for too long, and also ‘covid’. I didnt realise during remand you dont get any programmes. I wouldve thought $100M spend here could save $500M+
https://www.newsroom.co.nz/five-years-on-remand-justice-system-breaks-its-own-record
Well said Martyn. First our prisons need to be reclaimed from the gangs, and then rehabilitation given priority. Time to accept the evidence that many are released from prison angrier and more violent than when they entered.
Ah, the spirit of the past when families offered their sons and daughters to be soldiers priests or nuns.
Every family who has a member on a rabid crusade to lock people up for any crime, should offer a family member up who will sign up to work for corrections or in work servicing prisons.
The offspring of the loudest (probably from Kiwiblog), can be designated to work with those whom they want imprisoned without any chance of parole.
From the chapter “Law & ‘Results'” from Thomas Sowells’s book “Intellectuals & Society:
“the relevant comparison would be between the cost of keeping someone in prison versus the costs of letting a career criminal loose in society. In Britain, the total cost of the prison system per year was found to be £1.9 billion, while the financial cost alone of the crimes committed per year by criminals was estimated at £60 billion. (From: David Fraser, A Land Fit for Criminals, p. 109.)
The criminals can work building large national infrastructure projects.
Reopening former prisons in all provinces could create local jobs.
Every mothballed mental hospital should be reopened, with total beds immediately returning to 1970s per capita levels (and increasing to the level Ireland achieved in the 1960s).
The number of police will likely have to rise substantially until crime levels return to the average enjoyed prior to 1960s.
Restoring the full employment policy and reversing the collapse of wages would likely reduce the attractiveness of organised crime.
(See charts for historical wages measured in bullion, wages/salaries as a share of GDP, and unemployment over 100 year period)
I am a believer in the get tough on crime approach but once there they need the counsellors more than ever to try and stop the rot .They are literally a captive audience. These people often need mentail help or drug and alcohol support .
If you read the court pages you would know that these 600 prisoners must have done something really bad the first time or are repeat offenders thst the public need protection from. It is easy to forget the damage these offenders can cause as they carry out their crime . Many elderly fear to go out as they have come home to a ransacked home or their car has been broken into or stolen . Last year xmas was ruined for me as my car was broken into on xmas eve . Phone gone, credit cards gone , no side window for 2 weeks , $5000 gone (got half back as a sign of good will ) . This type of lose could be dramatic to someone without insurance or living week to week .
Out of idle curiosity, f it has to be about the money, what’s the annual cost of crime?
Is it possible to spend 60 million to save 235 million?
Meh… nz is full of wannabes and cowards dealing in vice. They throw a tantrum and think they’re staunch beating up on each other over their insecure bullshit. Drug reform would go a long way in solving most of New Zealands criminal activity.
Meh… nz is full of wannabes and cowards dealing in vice. They throw a tantrum and think they’re staunch beating up on each other over their insecure bullshit. Drug reform would go a long way in solving most of New Zealands criminal activity.
When it’s more important to get entire families into NZ on poverty wages of $43k per family or having no incomes such as being on study visas to keep an exploitative, bad situation going that is NZ mass immigration, then no wonder the prison population is rising.
It is easier not to work and turn to crime, than be on NZ stagnant wages with huge inflation and high interest rates, – but still government priority is to bring in more low waged migrant chefs, retail/fast food ‘mangers’, bus drivers and labourers to fill the void rather than solve the problems of low wages, fake jobs, unfulfilling jobs, lack of interest in working for those low wages and unfulfilling jobs, that NZ never used to have.
It is a joke that people who often are terrible at their jobs in their own country then can come to NZ and get instantly residency for the family as there is very little, quality control on NZ immigration and HR/recruitment here is appalling. Then our new ‘Kiwis’ go on to other countries and then years later get deported back here to NZ or be able to go on social security here.
OZ has greater satisfaction by paying better wages while not giving instant residency. See the problem? If you are a hard worker who wants to get ahead and send money back you go to OZ, if you are a scammer that wants easy residency and prepared to accept low wages or turn to crime with few consequences, you would come to NZ.
Examples of NZ poor residency policy, ISIS bride family who renounced her OZ citizenship but NZ desperate to give her residency, the mall terrorist who NZ refused to let leave when he didn’t want to stay here (and quit study after 1 month after getting in on a study visa but still here years later)! As if we don’t have enough high needs, ideological idiots who are born here to house and educate! Nope NZ loves to virtue signal how much we like to ‘help’ the stupid and dangerous overseas youth, while ignoring our own youth who increasingly are in serious strife, not encouraged to work by having many of our NZ wages similar to not working, and having a laize faire attitude to those hurting others financially and physically.
Comments are closed.