Latest / 360 with Katie Woolf / Independent Member for Araluen Robyn Lambley gives us a run down of estimates from Parliament

Transcript

Independent Member for Araluen Robyn Lambley gives us a run down of estimates from Parliament · 360 with Katie Woolf

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Now we know these estimates obviously continue, and yesterday it
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: was Chancey Pake in the hot seat with a number
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: of questions about corrections. Minister Pake appeared alongside the Corrections
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: com Commissioner Matthew Varley and revealed that the department had
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: paid thirteen point five three million dollars in overtime two
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: Corrections workers in the eleven months to May this year.
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: At the same time, attrition in corrections also increased two
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: percent to ten percent. When further questioned, though, neither mister
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: Pake nor mister Varley could tell the committee how many
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: job vacancies were present in Corrections, citing rolling recruitment processes.
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: Now joining me on the line to tell us a
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: bit more about this from her perspective is the Independent
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: member Ferarra lu And Robin Lamley. Good morning to.
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: You, Robin, Good morning Katie. Robin.
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: It sounds like it was an interesting day yesterday. You
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: accused the Justice Minister of deliberately avoiding answering questions. What
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: were you trying to get to the bottom of, Well.
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: He was avoiding answering questions around the vacancies within corrections.
• 1:08
  Speaker 2: We that is Steve Edgington, the Member for Barkley and
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: myself were tag teaming asking him multiple questions him and
• 1:17
  Speaker 2: the corrections Minister Commissioner about simply a simple question which
• 1:23
  Speaker 2: is asked to every minister in their portfolio, how many
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: vacancies do you have in your department? And they absolutely
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: refuse to answer it, which leads to one conclusion that
• 1:36
  Speaker 2: they're hiding it. And the other conclusion I think you
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: can safely make is that things are very very bad
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: within our prisons in terms of staffing. And in fact,
• 1:46
  Speaker 2: after the session with Minister Paig, I got a couple
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: of text messages confirming that that things are so bad
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: within the prisons there was a texta came through to
• 1:57
  Speaker 2: me saying that the Alice Springs Prison is operating on
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: half the staff at me goodness, meeking for the time.
• 2:04
  Speaker 2: I mean that must make crisis.
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: Well, that's right, That must make it incredibly difficult for
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: those stuff that are there to be able to do
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: their jobs. But I would imagine as well that it
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: has an impact then when it comes to some of
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: those rehabilitation programs and different things being delivered to try
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: and rehabilitate prisoners.
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: Well, it's not happening, Katie it's certainly not in the
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: Alice Springs Prison. I went out there a month ago,
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  Speaker 2: and I've had a long relationship with Alice Springs Prison.
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  Speaker 2: I was even an official visitor years ago before I
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: came into politics, around two thousand and eight or seven
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: or something like that. And I went out there a
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: month ago, and I could not believe the lack of activity.
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: A few years ago, and I have to say, under
• 2:49
  Speaker 2: the colp things were pumping out there. The industries were
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: going gangbusters. They were baking, they were making, printing, manufacturing
• 2:58
  Speaker 2: all sorts of different things. There was zip going on
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: out there when I went there a month ago, and
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: the minister tried to paint a picture that there were
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: things happening, but in actual fact, when you're on half
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: the staff you normally need and your prisoners are over
• 3:15
  Speaker 2: your prisons are over full. We have the highest incarceraate
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: we've probably ever seen in the Northern Territory. At the moment,
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: there is nothing really going on apart from the fact
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: they're being fed and they were spectacularly clean and tidy.
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: But rehabilitation, I don't think there's much going on at all,
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: probably anything. Really.
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: It is a big call to say that he was
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: deliberately trying not to answer questions. Why do you think
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: that was the case?
• 3:43
  Speaker 2: Because I think things are so bad. I think that
• 3:46
  Speaker 2: they just cannot get staff. When I was at the
• 3:50
  Speaker 2: prison in Alice Springs, I sat down with a few
• 3:54
  Speaker 2: of the chief executive staff there and they were saying
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: that that is their biggest problem at the moment. They
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: just cannot attract staff. And we were told yesterday by
• 4:06
  Speaker 2: Minister Kirby later on in the day, the Minister for
• 4:10
  Speaker 2: Employment the Public Service, that nationally this is a problem.
• 4:16
  Speaker 2: It's not unique to the Northern Territory, but we always
• 4:19
  Speaker 2: find it harder up here to attract people because we
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: are so remote, our climate is so extreme in the
• 4:26
  Speaker 2: desert in the top end, and the cost of living
• 4:29
  Speaker 2: is of course a lot higher. So I think that
• 4:34
  Speaker 2: the prisons in the Northern Territory are definitely facing a crisis.
• 4:38
  Speaker 2: They are acutely short staffed. And what we saw yesterday
• 4:44
  Speaker 2: was a Minister for Corrections and a Commissioner for Corrections
• 4:48
  Speaker 2: that were not telling territory in the truth.
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: What do you think needs to happen here, Robin.
• 4:55
  Speaker 2: Well, some honesty to start with that. Apparently we're not
• 4:58
  Speaker 2: going to get that. Look, I think there probably needs
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: to be some sort of inquiry made into it. Whether
• 5:04
  Speaker 2: it's issued at at some sort of high level, I
• 5:08
  Speaker 2: don't know. But when the government shuts down, they shut down,
• 5:12
  Speaker 2: and to get inside and find out what's really going
• 5:15
  Speaker 2: on is almost impossible. But you know, Budget Estimates is
• 5:20
  Speaker 2: a parliamentary committee and one of the requirements is that
• 5:24
  Speaker 2: anyone coming before a parliamentary committee must tell the truth.
• 5:30
  Speaker 2: And we were not being told the truth yesterday because
• 5:33
  Speaker 2: I look back just quickly this morning over previous estimates
• 5:37
  Speaker 2: and the contribution made by corrections ministers and corrections commissioners,
• 5:43
  Speaker 2: and they do they have in the past provided information
• 5:47
  Speaker 2: around staff vacancies. The commissioner yesterday was muddling around trying
• 5:53
  Speaker 2: to convince us that for some bizarre reason he couldn't
• 5:56
  Speaker 2: do that. Corrections is no different for many other service
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: that provides a twenty four hour service, like hospital, police
• 6:06
  Speaker 2: or many other public serve parts of the public service.
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  Speaker 2: Why he couldn't provide that information is a rational and
• 6:17
  Speaker 2: misleading Robin.
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: I know that there's going to be people listening this
• 6:20
  Speaker 1: morning thinking, you know, it is a massive call to
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: say that they're being misleading and you know, not passing
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: over that information to those out there listening who are
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: thinking that and are thinking to themselves, Oh, I don't
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: know about this. You know, what does Robin Lambley have
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: to actually support the claims that she's making that are
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: the prison systems in crisis? What would you say to them?
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: Well, go back over the transcript from yesterday. That should
• 6:46
  Speaker 2: be made public to territorians today. Have a look at
• 6:50
  Speaker 2: what he said and the number of questions we fired
• 6:54
  Speaker 2: at both the minister and the commissioner. He had every opportunity,
• 6:57
  Speaker 2: or they have every opportunity to provide that information. We
• 7:01
  Speaker 2: asked the same information as the Education Minister, the Health Minister,
• 7:06
  Speaker 2: every other minister that's come before the Estimates Committee could
• 7:09
  Speaker 2: answer that, but for some strange reason the Commissioner said
• 7:13
  Speaker 2: that he couldn't. It just didn't stack up. Look, it
• 7:16
  Speaker 2: is a serious allegation to make that I stand by it.
• 7:19
  Speaker 2: We were not given the truth yesterday in budget estimate.
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: Robin just very quickly, was there any further detail provided?
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: I know that you know that the prison right that
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: had happened was quite some time ago. Has there been
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: sort of any further detail provided? Throughout that process yesterday
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: as well when it comes to some of the damage
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: and some of the different incidents that we've seen in
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: our prisons over the last twelve months.
• 7:44
  Speaker 2: Look to be honest, we didn't even get to that,
• 7:47
  Speaker 2: which is a little bit remissive us really, but the
• 7:52
  Speaker 2: time just runs that so quickly, and we did thoroughly
• 7:58
  Speaker 2: scrutinize the the Minister and the Commissioner around the issue
• 8:04
  Speaker 2: of staffing because that was the glaring problem that it
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: arose yesterday. We didn't get to that, and that's something
• 8:11
  Speaker 2: that was remissive us. I suppose in hindsight.
• 8:15
  Speaker 1: I have no doubt Robin, that there'll be questions asked
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: at some other point as well throughout the parliamentary process.
• 8:21
  Speaker 2: Over No lady has not sung.
• 8:26
  Speaker 1: Well, Robin Laveley. We always appreciate your time. Unfortunately we
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: are going to have to leave it there, but will
• 8:31
  Speaker 1: no doubt catch up with you again soon.
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: Many thanks, Katie, Thank you,