Prison officials trying to rig report, claims Act

The Corrections Department has been accused of planning a skewed report on the success of its prisoner job training programmes in order to get more funding.

Yesterday in Parliament the Act Party alleged Corrections managers intended to write rigged reports on the success of the programmes, designed to help prisoners get a job when they leave jail.

The party revealed leaked emails between department managers which showed they were looking to skew a report to highlight successes.

"The report will be highly skewed as we are looking for our top inmate performers," the email said.

It asked Corrections managers to provide names of the "top 10" who had succeeded in finding jobs after release to "build the case for further funding".

The department will receive $30 million for inmate employment training this year.

Act deputy leader Muriel Newman asked how the public could have any confidence in the honesty of the research produced by the Government after reading the emails.

"Is this not another example of the Labour Government cooking the books to make their soft-on-crime policies look good?"

National and New Zealand First joined Act in criticising the department and Corrections Minister Paul Swain over the emails.

Mr Swain said he would look into the allegations, adding that the success of inmate education and training programmes was critical for prisoners and the community.

Corrections Department chief financial officer John Ryan said the department was researching the success of the employment programmes and the emails had been misinterpreted.

"The purpose of this research is to identify a group of inmates who successfully participated in inmate employment and compare these to a group who did not participate."

Mr Ryan said it was a small study to "highlight what works" and was not comprehensive.

"The department does not condone improper behaviour, nor is any involved in this situation."