New Zealand
Oceania
Material conditions
Rehabilitation
Work
New Zealand
Incarcerated people’ pay rates need to be increased, say reform advocates, who have labelled the current rates of 20 to 60 cents an hour as practically slave labour. The rates have not been touched for 20 years.
Oceania
Mental health
Facilities
Rehabilitation
New Zealand
Prisons are not colourful places. Typically, they are grey or some variation of a monochrome colour scheme. But increasingly, such a limited palette is being questioned for its impact on health and rehabilitation.
Oceania
Material conditions
Facilities
Overcrowding
New Zealand
Bed capacity across the country is projected to run out in 2027 on a best-case scenario, or worst-case, in June next year.
Oceania
Long-term prisoners
Health
Mental health
New Zealand
Contracts for the Improving Mental Health Service is due to end from June 2025. Mental health workers fear some imprisoned people who are suicidal, psychotic or suffering other serious psychological problems will be left without support when their contracts end.
Oceania
Justice
Drugs
Violence
Rehabilitation
New Zealand
Prison reform advocates say the Corrections department is unable to deliver effective rehabilitation for imprisoned people.
In the last financial year, Corrections spent $376 million on rehabilitation - but most of the programmes it ran reduced reoffending by less than 2 percent.
Oceania
Mental health
Material conditions
New Zealand
The discovery that some of Auckland’s most vulnerable prisoners have been locked inside their cells for up to two days at time, for as long as nine months, has alarmed lawyers advocating for the men.
Oceania
Mental health
Material conditions
Facilities
New Zealand
Prisoners seeking mental health support at a prison south of Palmerston North were waiting up to three months to see a clinician, inspectors say.
Oceania
Access to legal rights
Social ties
New Zealand
Close to 700 prisoners at one of the country’s biggest jails will soon be able to receive in-person visits for the first time since the pandemic started.
Oceania
Material conditions
Facilities
New Zealand
Prison labour is being used to build the new parts of Waikeria Prison, the site of a riot 18 months ago.
New Zealand: managing uncertainty
Analysis
Coronavirus
Oceania
Material conditions
Activities
Social ties
Work
New Zealand
As the COVID-19 outbreaks around the world suprised most governments, how did the New Zealand authorities respond to the crisis behind the bars? Were prison authorities prepared to avoid the spread of the virus? Which measures were taken and how did them impact prisoners’ lives?
Women
Oceania
Access to legal rights
Justice
Material conditions
Violence
New Zealand
Auckland Women’s Prison treated inmates in a “degrading,” “cruel” and “inhumane” manner in a “concerted effort to break their spirit,” according to a stinging ruling from a district court judge.
Coronavirus
Oceania
Health
Material conditions
Protest
New Zealand
While the protests at Waikeria shine a light on prisoner conditions, abuses of power and inhumane treatment in prison are not new and will continue until prisoner numbers significantly reduce.
Nouvelle-Zélande: une prison entièrement détruite après six jours d’émeutes
News
Oceania
Access to legal rights
Material conditions
Protest
Violence
New Zealand
This article is not available in English. This article is available in the following versions: French
Coronavirus
Oceania
Health
New Zealand
Women at an Auckland prison have been routinely confined to their cells for periods of up to 29 hours at a stretch - well outside the law, which says they should get at least one hour out of their cells a day.
RNZ took evidence of the lockdown hours including a recently released prisoner’s diary, t…