The entrance to NRCF, known as Ngawha Prison in Northland. Photo / Northern Advocate
The entrance to NRCF, known as Ngawha Prison in Northland. Photo / Northern Advocate
OPINION
The prison muster following the change of government is guaranteed to rise.
The late Māori lawyer Moana Jackson once said New Zealand “per capita, per head of population, is one of the biggest builders of prisons in the world”. But what has this costly populist policy achieved?
We have almost 9000 inmates and Māori make up more than 60 per cent of that number. It is a national disgrace.
The High Court, just a few days ago, issued a decision saying Corrections is failing to meet legal entitlements for prisoners, with evidence some inmates hadn’t seen their tamariki for up to two years, plus a heap of other breaches of basic human rights issues.
This judgment came out against a backdrop of critical staffing issues, with Corrections saying it’s having “pressure meetings” due to capacity challenges.
So isn’t it time to change the expensive and punitive Westminster system to an approach that’s more evolved, that stems the tide of recidivism and therefore is more cost-effective?
It takes leadership that’s humanitarian, not punitive
This is not novel territory but it takes leadership with guts that’s humanitarian, not punitive. It’s not like a different approach hasn’t happened in other countries before to positive effect.
Lessons can be learned from offshore solutions, where prisons are being dismantled or abolished as opposed to the proposed coalition policy here of more people locked up.
I wanted to find out with my own eyes because it’s one thing to be ideological but another to see the practical reality in action. What would a demarcated world look like?
This prison has no bars or walls and no escapes
I went with a party of six to Whistler, Canada, to visit an indigenous prison.
It had no fences and no bars around it. We met the warden and three elders who were on duty who gave us an insight into the prisoners.
Besides the memory, I brought home a lanyard that you hang around your neck. I bought one because of the kōrero by the prisoner who made it.
It must have had about a million tiny little beads on it. The prisoner said to me while looking at the lanyard, “Every bead I threaded, I found my sanity. Because this place is a sanctuary for the insane.” He found his sanity with every thread.
Dame Naida Glavish has returned from a fact-finding tour of a prison in Canada.
He thought about who he was and why he was there, and what he did to get there.
They call the prison a residence. It’s got its own sweat lodge and the coldest stream I’ve ever put my toes into. The inmates come out of their hot sweat lodge straight into their stream to heal.
They took us to their longhouse with its mud floor to stay in touch with the earth. While the floor is muddy, their indications are beautiful.
Coming back to Aotearoa and reflecting on that experience, in my respectful opinion, we should have tangata whenua governance boards for each rohe linked to the 18 prisons throughout this country.
Every prison CEO should develop a meaningful relationship with Māori as part of key performance indicators. These CEOs need to work with Māori given the disproportionate numbers of our people in the system.
Moves to put young Māori from Korowai Manaaki straight into prison and close down the youth residence centres and just throw them in jail is wrong.
When in Whistler, due to the freedom the prisoners had, I asked one obvious question. Because there are no bars and no fences, had there been any escapes? The answer was really quite short — no.
New Zealand must look at a co-governance model to support Māori to stay out of prison. In 2017, King Tuheitia assessed Te Whare Oranga Ake, an outside-the-wire pilot programme through HB Prison preparing long-term inmates in their last year for release.
One of the reasons is it’s built at the top of the highest mountain and is in the middle of a forest of black bears. No one would risk it.
Ngawha corrections facility in Te Tai Tōkerau was supposed to be like that. No prison walls and live-in residences and a tangata whenua governance board.
I’ve got no doubt in my mind that every prisoner would benefit from this approach, given this boy saying to me, “with every bead I threaded, I found my sanity”.
In Aotearoa we have prisoners put inside and simply locked away as total write-offs.
Whereas they should be in a clinic and receiving attention to see where their wairua is at. That’s not disregarding the victims either because they’ve been considered resulting in the jail time.
Many of our people who are incarcerated have been traumatised by parents, school teachers, priest brutality — but none of them receive a consultation with a Māori clinical psychologist so they can receive proper help in jail.
The mindset is to invest in prisons and recruit more staff despite the strain, rather than valuing Māori using our restorative hohou rongo processes to deal with the victim as well as the perpetrator.
It’s a trillion-dollar industry that’s a pipeline from OT to Corrections built on the misery of our people.
Not reforming the present mass incarceration system, and instead filling up prisons no matter what the human and financial cost, is highly questionable and that’s the real insanity.
