BY ROBERTO JORQUERA
PERTH — The Deaths in Custody Watch Committee launched its prisoner rights campaign at a public meeting attended by 100 people here on January 24.
"The time is long overdue for a broad-ranging and concerted community campaign to radically improve the treatment of prisoners", the watch committee stated in its first campaign newsletter, Outside In. "We need your support in developing community involvement in prison reform and challenging the punishment-oriented justice system which claims to deal with crime, but in reality reinforces divisions within society and does little to address the root causes of crime."
The author of the watch committee's report to the UN Committee Against Torture, Mark Cox, spoke of the horrific state of Western Australia's prisons. According to statistics contained in the report, WA has the highest rate of deaths in custody in Australia and cases of self-harm had doubled between 1998 and 1999. Its prison population rose 29% between 1998 and 1999. Despite constituting only 3% of the state's population, one-third of prisoners were Aboriginal; 76% of prisoners were unemployed before imprisonment.
Former watch committee chairperson Glen Shaw and Sir Ronald Wilson, the co-author of the report on the stolen generations, Bringing them Home, also spoke.
Those who would like to help out can contact the Deaths in Custody Watch Committee on (08) 9227 5751.