Victoria pours a further $36m into unneeded prison

The extra money will go towards keeping the empty prison staffed in case the fire alarms go off or somebody tries to build a tunnel inside of it.

The Victorian government will spend a further $36 million next year to maintain a new $1 billion prison which public servants have admitted is not needed anymore.

Victorian Treasurer Tim Pallas handed down the state budget on Tuesday, allocating $36 million in the next financial year to “maintain and secure” the new Western Plains prison, which was completed late last year but is not in use.

The maximum-security prison located on the outskirts of Geelong has capacity for more than 1000 men, and cost more than $1 billion to construct over nearly three years.

The budget confirmed that the total amount the Victorian government has invested in the new prison is $1.069 billion, with a further $36 million to be provided in 2023-24.

Despite the continued spending, Victoria does not need the new prison. The facility was announced at a time when the Victorian prison population was skyrocketing, due largely to heavy-handed changes to the state’s bail laws, which senior public servants have now admitted were a mistake.

The Covid pandemic saw a significant drop in the prison population and these levels have been largely maintained despite a lifting of most restrictions.

The budget showed that on average in 2022-23 there were 6550 people in custody, a large drop from the expected average of 7518. Victoria’s prisons are only at 80% currently, even before the new Western Plains prison is put into operation.

The amount Victoria will spend on just maintaining the new and unused prison pales in comparison to spending in the budget aiming to reduce the number of people entering custody or the criminal justice system.

The Victorian government allocated less than 20%, or $7.1 million, of the prison spend to the Victorian Aboriginal Legal Service to expand its regional hub model.

VACRO has also raised concerns about the money provided to the new prison and lack of funds for services aimed at assisting people to reintegrate into the community from incarceration, saying there was not any further money provided to strengthen family connections, create employment opportunities or provide therapeutic support.

“These services must be delivered by specialised community organisations that can work with participations both pre and post-release to ensure continuity of care,” VACRO said in a statement.

“While there is no money in this budget for these kinds of services, another $36 million has been allocated to keep a new and unneeded prison open and empty. VACRO is concerned that the momentum gained through effective investments made while the prison population was reduced as a result of Covid-19 might be undermined by a lack of further investment this year.”

The Yoorook Justice Commission recently heard that the Western Plains prison was originally built as a largely remand facility to cater for the growing number of people placed in prison due to the state’s controversial bail reforms.

“The decision was very much based on the fact that we had an increase in prison population and increasing prison population of remandees,” Corrections Victoria deputy commissioner Larissa Strong told the truth commission.

“That prison has now been built but it’s not operating. We don’t have money to operate that prison, because our demand has dropped. So we don’t need to use those beds.”

The ongoing funding is needed to ensure there are people on site to respond to fire alarms, ensure showers and the water membrane don’t crack and to make sure that someone doesn’t break into it to build a tunnel, Strong told the commission.

The Western Plains prison will now likely eventually replace existing ageing infrastructure rather than offering new beds, Corrections Minister Enver Erdogan told the commission.

“The goal is to operationalise it in due course,” Erdogan said.

“Right now because we haven’t had the increase in prison population that they were expecting in 2018 and because the numbers have almost stabilised at the moment, I’m not sure how much of that is the Covid impact, but the long term plan is now to hire people and eventually operationalise it.”