Ashley Youth Detention Centre detainees are being left with nothing to do after hours and on weekends, report says

Juvenile detainees locked up in Tasmania have been left with nearly nothing to do after hours, creating “tough” times for staff, a new report reveals.

• $4.3 million extra spent looking after increased prison population
• Ashley Youth Detention Centre abuse alleged over decades

KIDS locked up at Ashley Youth Detention Centre have been left with nothing to do during the evenings, on weekends, or over long five-days breaks at Easter, a new report says.

Staff at the youth correctional facility, during its most recent three-yearly inspection, commented there was “too much spare time”, “they only have games or TV”, and “after hours, it all stops”.

“Weekends are tough and Easter is worse with five days with nothing for youth to do,” one staff member said, according to Custodial Inspector Richard Connock.

In his newly tabled Inspection of Youth Custodial Services report, Mr Connock noted “a significant period” had lapsed since inspections were undertaken at the facility near Deloraine in November 2018.

Mr Connock attributed that delay to “resourcing constraints”.

The Department of Communities said that during the “considerable time” that had lapsed between the inspection and the published report, some programs had already been implemented after school hours on the weekends.

It said these included fitness classes and teamwork activities such as the ice bucket challenge for motor neurone disease awareness.

The department also said planning had begun for additional activities in the future, such as attending a Dawn Service on Anzac Day, running sport clinics, and offering opportunities for Ashley inmates to be involved in animal husbandry, weekly chores, maintenance and farm work.

Detainees at the Ashley Youth Detention Centre are often left with nothing to do after hours and on weekends and holidays.

Mr Connock also offered recommendations such as offering additional life skills courses to help detainees transition back into the community, along with programs on family violence and sexual health.

Mr Connock said the centre’s education program needed to be formalised after hearing educational outcomes were “a bit wishy-washy”, with inmates not offered vocational qualifications or statements of attainment.

In a separate report tabled in parliament this time last year, in which redacted sections were not properly concealed, Mr Connock noted the youth detention centre had numerous security problems including a scalable fence, CCTV footage that was not properly monitored and detainees’ phone calls were not being recorded.

That report said security at the centre appeared to operate “mainly on trust”.

Ashley Youth Detention Centre could also soon find itself the centre of a class action, with more than 100 former detainees claiming they were subject to an array of abuse, mostly while incarcerated between the 1970s and early 2000s.

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