South Australian Government expects $250k bill to help prisoners kick smoking habit

PRISONERS trying to kick smoking habits while behind bars are receiving hundreds of thousands of dollars of free nicotine patches from the State Government.

South Australian Government paying hundreds of thousands of dollars to help prisoners kick smoking habit.

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PRISONERS trying to kick a smoking habit behind bars are receiving hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of free nicotine patches from the State Government.

Documents released to the Opposition show the expected budget for distributing patches at the Adelaide Remand Centre this financial year is $250,000.

That is up from about $20,000 in 2015-16 and $100,000 in 2016-17.

The Correctional Services Department says it is “in the process of rolling out nicotine lozenges rather than patches” to cut costs but has not said how much money the change would save.

Correctional Services Minister Chris Picton

It says only that lozenges are “expected to be much cheaper and that will result in significant cost savings”.

The patches are provided to alleged offenders held in the remand centre in the CBD, where smoking has been banned since 2015.

The department has prepared a plan to expand the ban, which has been put to Correctional Services Minister Chris Picton, but has not revealed any details.

South Australia is the only state which is yet to ban smoking inside its prisons. Currently, prisoners can buy cigarettes in jail and smoke in their cells.

The public sector union, which represents jail guards, is urging the State Government to fast track the ban. In September the Public Service Association lodged a complaint in the Industrial Relations Commission, saying its members were “sick and tired” of being exposed to second-hand smoke.

Other government workplaces are smoke-free.

A smoking ban imposed by the Victorian Government in 2015 sparked rioting.

New South Wales jails went smoke-free the same year and prisoners were provided with nicotine patches. Opposition correctional services spokesman Stephan Knoll, who obtained the costings, accused the SA Government of “sitting on their hands” instead of progressing the ban.

Mr Knoll questioned why it was trialled on remandees who would soon be released into the community or a jail where smoking was allowed.

He said the trial should have been run in a prison with a longer-term population.

“They don’t really take it (quitting) seriously because they know when they go to another prison they’re going to be able to smoke again,” he said. “They way they’ve gone about this is ineffective.”

A government spokeswoman said it was “continuing to consider the next steps for smoking reduction in prisons” and was evaluating “in detail” lessons learned from interstate prison systems.

About 80 per cent of prisoners say they smoke.