It says plenty about the twisted priorities of this Labor government that it would protect the rights of murderers to have babies behind bars

When you go to prison for murder, or any other serious offence that lands you in maximum security, it means you are deprived of your liberty and that should include the opportunity to procreate.

Victoria’s reputation as Australia’s epicentre of ideological lunacy was boosted this week with the Herald Sun exclusive that a murderer was leaving a maximum-security prison to undergo IVF treatment.

The sheer derangement behind this decision is hard to digest.

Here we have a brutal killer, who is serving a 16-year-term, allowed to leave prison to have scans, egg collection and other procedures in order to fall pregnant.

And, despite the claims from authorities that the entire exercise is “self-funded” by Alicia Schiller, rest assured that Victorian taxpayers are paying a sizeable amount to facilitate this madness.

Presumably, the murderess who stabbed mother of three Tyrelle Evertsen-Mostert to death in 2014 is not waltzing out of the Dame Phyllis Frost Centre unaccompanied and catching a tram to the nearest IVF facility.

Alicia Schiller (right) with the woman she murdered Tyrelle Evertsen-Mostert.

A sophisticated and well-staffed security operation, paid for by the state, would be required every time this woman is allowed to leave prison to visit a hospital or medical facility

to receive treatments and undergo tests.

And then there are the costs of raising a child in a maximum-security prison.

Why are we paying for a murderer to have a child behind bars – a child who will be condemned to a horrible existence in prison until the age of five and then taken away from the only people she or he knows until the mother’s release?

It’s cruel and unusual.

And, it’s an absolute insult to Schiller’s many victims, including the children of the woman she murdered over $50, one of whom was just four years old and present when his mother was brutally killed.

Another of Schiller’s victims is Evertsen-Mostert’s eldest son, Tobias, who was 12 when he became an orphan, having lost his father a year earlier.

The 22-year-old’s comments about this travesty are heart-wrenching. This child was robbed of his mother’s love, protection and pride. He had no parent to applaud his achievements as a teenager and young man.

“I was an orphan when this bitch did this, my dad died a year earlier, so all my milestones as a kid, I had nobody to celebrate them, I had no parents,” he said.

“You left three kids motherless, you animal. You stabbed your friend. I stand strongly against this (the IVF treatment).”

Tobias, as a child, with his loving mother Tyrelle.

Tobias Evertsen-Mostert, now aged 22.

In typical fashion the Jacinta Allan government has tried to wash its hands of this saga with the Premier saying it would be “deeply inappropriate” to comment on the private health matters of individuals and pointing the finger at a Supreme Court ruling.

“As the circumstances stand today, there is a Supreme Court ruling that provides for a pathway for prisoners to access this private health treatment,” she said.

That attempt at dodging responsibility looked particularly ridiculous on Thursday when Labor struck down a private member’s Bill that would strip prisoners of access to IVF.

It says plenty about the twisted priorities of this Labor government that it would protect the rights of murderers to have babies behind bars.

When you go to prison for murder, or any other serious offence that lands you in maximum security, it means you are deprived of your liberty and that should include the opportunity to procreate.

In the case of Schiller, she’s caused enough damage to children’s lives; the three boys she’s deprived of a mother and her own child.

Jim and Yvonne Gentle and son Jason Gentle who was the father of the child that was in the house when Tyrelle was killed. Picture: David Caird

The boys’ aunt, Miranda Evertsen-Mostert, summed it up when she said: “She was a mum once, but not a good one. How does her child feel? She’s been abandoned and is now going to be replaced.

“Another child traumatised, being brought up in jail for five years.”

How many other violent offenders will follow her?

What prisoner serving a lengthy sentence and of child-bearing age wouldn’t opt to have a baby behind bars?

And presumably at some point these children will sue the government for being forced to spend their formative years behind bars …

IN SHORT

ABC chairman Kim Williams has embarrassed himself on the global stage after his ill-advised, ignorant rant about the world’s most-listened-to podcaster, Joe Rogan, went viral.

After admitting to not being a listener himself, Williams launched into a hysterical, fact-free diatribe in which he accused Rogan of “preying on people’s vulnerabilities” and being “really quite malevolent.”

He also said he found Rogan’s popularity “deeply repulsive” and was “absolutely in dismay that this can be a source of public entertainment”.

Williams should be embarrassed by how out of touch and comically clueless he is about the current media environment.

That he is the chairman of a national broadcaster that receives more than $1bn of taxpayer funds should be the cause for deep concern.