Recommendation 1: The WA Government and the Department of Corrective Services prioritise and fund the construction of a new purpose-built remand facility for the Perth metropolitan area that incorporates aspects of design that will facilitate best practice and technology in remand prisons, and meet international obligations with regard to meeting the rights of unconvicted persons in custody.
Recommendation 2: Ensure that every new prisoner is provided contact with a family member or other community contact person during reception or, if unsuccessful, upon placement in their Unit.
Recommendation 3: Create privacy booths or shells for people using the Prisoner Telephone System.
Recommendation 4: The Department review prison catering at Hakea Prison against the 2013 Australian Dietary Guidelines, and implement a system of meal choices in line with the prison’s role as a remand facility which houses people with diverse health and cultural needs.
Recommendation 5: Hakea Prison should provide facilities that allow all prisoners to properly wash and dry their own undergarments.
Recommendation 6: Hakea Prison should provide regular and frequent opportunities for fathers to have visits with their children in a normalised environment, following appropriate risk assessments.
Recommendation 7: The Department should implement Skype or other telepresence technologies as a way to facilitate social contact in all prisons, and should trial community-based ‘e-visit centres’ where families can attend for such visits.
Recommendation 8: Hakea management to consult and collaborate to implement a recreation program that is safe and accessible to all prisoners.
Recommendation 9: Within security requirements, Hakea should ensure that prisoners of all faiths have regular, routine and equitable access to religious, pastoral and cultural services.
Recommendation 10: Hakea health centre should proactively follow up with prisoners in relation to pending appointments and extra patients should be scheduled for each GP session to ensure that the services of medical staff are not wasted by non-attendances.
Recommendation 11: Ensure that food safety training is consistently delivered to all food handlers in the kitchen and accommodation units regardless of the presence or absence of particular members of staff.
Recommendation 12: Provide access to effective cleaning agent to all prisoners for the purpose of reducing transmission of blood borne viruses through the sharing of tattooing instruments and needles.
Recommendation 13: The Department should implement a concerted, sustained and multipronged campaign to reduce smoking among prisoners and should eliminate unwanted cell sharing by non-smokers and smokers.
Recommendation 14: Re-establish a suitable alternative placement within Hakea Prison for people needing extended support and monitoring under the SAMS program.
Recommendation 15: Prioritise the creation of appropriate interview facilities to facilitate assessment and counselling of prisoners.
Recommendation 16: Ensure all protection prisoners, regardless of accommodation placement, are given equal access to all services provided to mainstream prisoners, including recreation and education.
Recommendation 17: Revise incentives to ensure that Aboriginal prisoners are strongly and appropriately represented within the peer support team at Hakea Prison, including reception and orientation.
Recommendation 18: Based on staff and prisoner consultation, Hakea management should develop a new system of meaningful, achievable and reliable prisoner incentives.
Recommendation 19: Construct a new purpose-built Management Unit within Hakea Prison that can safely administer the full range of services and regimes currently required by Unit 1.
Recommendation 20: The Department of Corrective Services and the Department of the Attorney General better communicate and coordinate court services to ensure more efficient, effective and predicable video court operations across the state.
Recommendation 21: The Department of Corrective Services must meet its legal obligation to provide adequate access to appropriate legal resources, materials and equipment to enable all remand and appeal class prisoners to fully participate in their cases, should they wish to do so.
Recommendation 22: In line with the findings in this report, the Department should improve the welfare component of Unit Management at Hakea.
Recommendation 23: The Department’s self-paced learning project should be transferred out of Hakea to become a head office project, and the existing staff should re-establish a broad range of education and training courses.
Recommendation 24: Initial Individual Management Plan assessments should be undertaken by staff based at the facility in which the prisoner is accommodated, not remotely from the Hakea Assessment Centre.
Recommendation 25: Monitoring and recording systems in control should be upgraded, system maintenance prioritised and CCTV coverage extended to minimise blind spots.
Recommendation 26: The Department should examine the security benefits and cost-effectiveness of providing public access to the Women’s Remand and Reintegration Facility from Warton Road, and of installing a boom gate to better control access to staff car parks and other service areas alongside the Hakea Prison perimeter wall.
Recommendation 27: The Department should consider additional non-invasive solutions for detection of contraband in prisons, for use with visitors, staff, contractors and prisoners.
Recommendation 28: The Department of Corrective Services should ensure that accounts are paid in accordance with Treasurer’s Instruction 323 which requires that ‘all commercial payments shall be paid within 30 days of the receipt of the creditor’s claim’.
Recommendation 29: The process associated with the Commissioner’s Vacancy Approval Checklist be amended, so the Department of Corrective Services adheres with Section 7 of the Public Sector Management Act 1994 that ‘public sector bodies are to be so structured and administered as to enable decision to be made and action taken, without excessive formality and with a minimum of delay.’
Responses by DCS to inspection recommendations can be downloaded by clicking this link.