PENAL ESTABLISHMENTS.

Southland Times, Issue 757, 2 December 1867, Page 1 (Supplement)

PENAL ESTABLISHMENTS.

(From the Southland Times, Nov. 29.) The excessive burden of taxation that the colonists of New Zealand are called upon to bear has aroused a spirit of investigationalikebeneficial to both statesmen and laymen. The incompatibility of the provincial system with cheap and efficient government is rapidly becoming a universally accepted fact, and strenuous efforts are being made to reconstruct the machinery with the view of lightening its cost and increasing its efficiency. In a previous issue we reviewed the debate in the Assembly, on a motion of Mr Travers, as to the control of public departments — the police, gaols, harbors, <fee, and the necessity of their being centralised. In that article we confined ourselves almost exclusively to the question of the constabulary organization. The next important subject to be dealt with is that of gaol management. Among the largest items of expenditure the maintenance and supervision of criminals stands conspicuous. In this colony we have numerous so-called petty penal establishments, exceedingly inefficient, and kept up at a cost to the country far exceeding that of any other British colony. Each province is compelled to build prison houses, maintain a costly staff, and keep its criminals for the most part in almost luxuriant idleness. It is true that occasionally a small gang of shortsentence men are employed in cleaning gutters, digging drains, and, with a genuine Government stroke, patching up small portions of the highway. This, however, we cannot consider even an equivalent for the demoralizing influence that must arise from the exhibition of men engaged in the public streets under cover of a loaded rifle. Let us, however, more closely investigate the working of the gaol system of New Zealand, and contrast it with that in operation in the neighbouring colony of Victoria. New Zealand has its nine separate establishments, its nine governors, and nine staffs of officials, all highly paid. There is no systematic classification of criminals. The degrading spectacle is presented of the worst class being placed side by side with prisoners whose offences are comparatively of a trifling nature, consequently whatever latent good may have existed in the latter previous to entering the gaol, is effectually eradicated by their contact with older and more hardened offenders. There is no description of useful employment offered to them, except in very rare cases, that would divert the attention of the criminal mind from brooding over imaginary wrongs or forming schemes of fresh crimes, when once again let loose upon society. Even children of tender age are thrown into immediate contact with ruffians who would delight in still deeper poisoning their moralperceptions and educating them as criminal experts. Look at the contrast. Victoria, destitute of the facilities for penal and reformatory establishments such as is presented by the numerous islands in New Zealand, which are eminently adaptable, from their isolated character for such purposes, has its central penal station, and its reformaI tories, all under a perfect system of classification. It has prison hulks for the most hardened, a central stockade settlement in which lesser criminals are confined, and a reformatory. In each of these establishments a strict system of classification is carried out. Trades are taught to those that are young ii> crime, and hard labor enforced upon the more abandoned. Her district gaols are used only for the purpose of securing prisoners until their trial is over and the sentence passed. By this system of centralization, prison labor is turned to profitable purpose, the gaol expenditure reduced, and the probability of reformation, with the security of offenders, secured. "Why is not such the case in New Zealand ? Because the provincial system is destructive of unity of action, in seeking to retain the control of those institutions, that in other colonies are essentially under the direction of the Colonial Government. What i 3 the result ? Extravagance, inefficiency and demoralization. We find that during the last few months in the provinces of Otago, Canterbury, Nelson, and Auckland, where it would be reasonable to imagine the gaols would be strong and secure, and the supervision efficient, prisoners have escaped. In some cases they have been recaptured, J but in others no trace of their retreat has been discovered. It is only very recently that the Nelson press had to condemn the practice of allowing deep-dyed criminals to remain in such insecure lodgments as the provincial gaols afford, and instances were cited where the notorious Sullivan was permitted to bandy jokes with the passers by from the prison windows! Can anyone suppose that where such a lax system exists, 9,_ wholesome terror (jf^ha [aw^tfttiHi

or a dread of the inside of, a gaol, is" inculcated in the mind of the criminal? Certainly not. "Until the General Government have full control of the gaols and police — until a colonial system is perfected and put in operation, the management of the dangerous classes will become more and more difficult and expensive. The more these questions are discussed the more apparent becomes the fact that the provincial system is incomputable with good government, and that nntil a great central power can be created, and a system similar to that of Victoria is put into operation, police and goal expenditure will continue to absorb a major part of the revenue of the colony and still remain defective. If a central penal establishment was formed, the existing nine staff of gaolers, warders, &c, would be diminished to a nominal figure, while criminals would learn to realize the certainty of punishment. In any light we view this subject, twist or turn it as we may, until the colony is united, and there is one police force, one central penal establishment, and one code of gaol regulations for the whole of the provinces^ neither bur police or gaols will be economically or efficiently managed.