159: Inspection of Greenough Regional Prison

Greenough Regional Prison (Greenough) holds prisoners of all security classifications, minimum, medium and maximum (remand only). It accommodates sentenced and remanded men and women. Greenough opened in 1984 as a minimum-security facility. It was upgraded in 1990 to a medium-security prison. A riot occurred in July 2018 which badly damaged infrastructure and impacted staff and prisoners’ …

A lack of strategic planning had foreseeable consequences The Department of Justice (the Department) had yet to finalise its strategic framework to guide the functions and priorities of Greenough Regional Prison (Greenough). Local business plans that map out priorities were often overtaken by statewide challenges such as record high population levels and ageing infrastructure. These …

In the absence of state-wide strategic planning, Greenough Regional Prison was developing initiatives and setting local priorities. But this work was overtaken by rising prisoner numbers and system level imperatives to accommodate them. Greenough had not been resourced to anticipate or keep pace with population growth and the diversity of prisoners’ needs. Services, staffing, and …

Recommendation 1 Government should support and resource agreed objectives and priorities developed as part of the Department’s strategic planning work. Recommendation 2 The Department should, as part of its strategic planning framework, audit Greenough’s current and future infrastructure and cohort requirements to inform its future plans. Recommendation 3 Improve access to freshly prepared and self-catered …