Jailing is failing our nation on every front – it leads to more offenders committing more crimes, more disadvantage and more cost to the taxpayer.
In Tasmania, the criminal justice system is broken. This report shows that successive governments have relied too heavily on incarceration as a default response to both disadvantage and offending. This has sent imprisonment rates soaring, while failing to address the underlying drivers of crime and ignoring the evidence which shows diversionary programs and effective community-based interventions deliver better outcomes, in terms of community safety.
This report is a snapshot of a system that fails too many in NSW. Instead of reducing the likelihood of reoffending, prison entrenches existing disadvantage and increases the likelihood of ongoing criminal justice system involvement, often over generations.
Since 2012, the South Australian prison population has grown by almost 50%. An over-reliance on imprisonment as a default response to both disadvantage and offending has resulted in a situation where too many people in the justice system are unnecessarily trapped in a cycle of harmful and costly incarceration.