NT Govt should consider reopening the Darwin watch house to alleviate pressure on Palmerston
THE closed Darwin watch house could be the answer to alleviating the pressures on the busy Palmerston watch house.
Opinion
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THE closed Darwin watch house could be the answer to alleviating the pressures on the busy Palmerston watch house.
The Palmerston watch house, the only watch house for the Greater Darwin region, is now housing a number of prisoners on remand as they wait to be processed into the Darwin Correctional Centre.
While police and NT Corrections say there is no staffing issue, loading up the watch house with people who should be going to prison will no doubt put a strain on everyone involved, from cops and corrections to the cleaners and food handlers.
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If there isn’t enough room to house everyone, as the United Workers Union has said, perhaps some kind of arrangement can be worked out that would make use of the vacant Darwin watch house.
It can’t be safe for police, corrections officers or remanded people to be crammed into the Palmerston watch house with no prospect of time outside or respite from others locked in the cell.
If the prison is full, as the union says, then the government and relevant agencies need to assess how to go about ensuring it is not over capacity again with people forced to sit in the Palmerston watch house.
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Does the prison need extending, the Darwin watch house need reopening, or do we need more rehabilitative programs to get people back on track and released from prison sooner?
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