Council’s letter to corrections minister over prison survey ‘utterly disingenuous’, says opponent

Opponents of a prison at Westbury have hit out at the local council over its response to a survey on the proposal and called for the immediate release of the survey results.

THE Westbury community group opposing the development of a 275-bed prison in their town has taken aim at the Meander Valley Council, calling a letter it sent to Corrections Minister Elise Archer “utterly disingenuous”.

A mail-out survey being conducted by independent consultant Myriad Research for SGS Economics, to inform a social and economic impact report on the potential development of a northern prison at Westbury, was completed last week.

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Ms Archer said the survey was posted to 8500 households – almost all of the 8645 households in the Meander Valley Local Government Area.

She said a further 120 surveys were mailed out on request.

Meander Valley Mayor Wayne Johnston wrote to Ms Archer to let her know residents across the area hadn’t received a survey.

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Corrections Minister Elise Archer addresses the crowd at a community meeting at Westbury in December. Picture: PATRICK GEE

“Some people were looking out for it, some people weren’t that fussed, others were for the prison, there were some that were against the prison,” he said.

“I just wanted to raise it with the minister … that concerns were being raised with myself and that the survey probably didn’t go as far across the municipality as what the Government had hoped for or as far as the council was hoping for.”

Westbury Residents Against the Prison president Linda Poulton said it had been “abundantly clear” since the postal survey was announced in December that not everyone in the municipality would receive a survey.

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“This is not earth-shattering news, for the Council or anyone else for that matter,” she said.

“For supporters of the prison and the Council to entreat the Minister now to ensure everyone in the municipality receives a survey is utterly disingenuous.”

Ms Poulton said the opposition group suspects the survey has not turned out the way supporters of the Westbury prison proposal had hoped.

“The survey results need to be immediately released so that the community can see the real reason why proponents for the prison are only now calling for it to be set aside.”

Ms Archer said the full report partly informed by the survey would be released “in due course”.