(Image: AAP/Paul Miller)

This week the disability royal commission heard tales of abuse and neglect from people with disabilities in youth detention and adult prisons. One woman described being constantly dropped while being moved in and out of her wheelchair and said she was denied physiotherapy to slow the progression of muscular dystrophy. An Indigenous man said he was denied his antidepressants and asthma puffer. A hearing-impaired man said he didn’t have an Auslan interpreter for weeks. 

The mistreatment and lack of integration with the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) meant people were not supported in prison or when released, and as such were more likely to re-offend, experts told the commission.

Prison and detention are expensive, costing taxpayers billions. Mistreatment and the use of solitary confinement, experts allege, breach international human rights laws and cause lifelong trauma to those leaving the system, hindering them from reintegrating into society.

Inaccessible cells

Dianne Lyons has muscular dystrophy. Imprisoned for four years — before winning an appeal and having her convictions thrown out — she said when she first arrived, prison staff sent her to hospital because they didn’t know how to deal with her wheelchair.

She said she thought staff “were trying to kill her” when they repeatedly dropped her while transferring her in and out of her wheelchair. Modifications she was promised, including handrails, weren’t made to the prison during her stay. She spent four weeks in an observation cell with an inaccessible toilet — meaning she had to wait hours until a staff member was available to help her. Her wheelchair was taken off her from 6pm until 7.30am the next day. 

She was hospitalised for malnutrition multiple times, developed five bacterial infections and was denied a physiotherapist funded by the NDIS, which she said caused her muscular dystrophy to progress faster. She went into prison being able to walk a little and left unable to walk. 

The commission heard NDIS assessments, where staff go over a person with disability needs, were conducted over the phone, meaning they were unable to be fully assessed.

Little action on First Nations peoples

One Indigenous man known as “Nathan” had 10 stays at Perth’s Banksia Hill juvenile detention centre between 2012 and 2017, entering the system aged 11. He’s been diagnosed with depression, anxiety and ADHD, and said he never had a regular psychiatrist and that his medications were constantly changed. 

“Banksia took me to a dark place and ruined my life,” he said.

He described being kept in a filthy, urine-smelling room for solitary confinement. The lights were left on 24/7 and he said he had no mattress or bedding and was forced to sleep naked on the concrete floor. His clothes had been taken off him to “prevent self-harm”. He alleges he was beaten by guards and called racial slurs. 

First Nations children are 26 times more likely to be imprisoned than non-First Nations children in Australia. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples make up 26% of the prison population but constitute just 2.5% of the general population. Indigenous incarceration rates are going up, not down. The number of First Nations youth who are incarcerated increased from 36% to 51% in the past year in NSW. 

Expensive and ineffective

Incarceration is incredibly expensive, costing Australian taxpayers more than $5 billion a year — or $330 per prisoner per day. NSW youth detention costs have increased to $713,940 per child per year. 

So why are standards in prisons so low yet so expensive? CEO and principal solicitor of the National Justice Project George Newhouse gave evidence on Thursday as part of a panel of human rights experts. He told Crikey there wasn’t enough focus on individuals in prison, and people were treated as “social outcasts”. 

“They are roadkill on the journey of the institution,” he said. 

“Prisons and youth detention centres run for the benefit of those who are employed or contracted to those organisations.”

Issues of prisoner mistreatment have been raised time and time again. In 2018, advocacy organisations called for an inquiry into the use of solitary confinement for people with disabilities in WA prisons. 

Solitary confinement was a routine punishment for those going through mental health crises, the commission heard. Rather than use de-escalation techniques, staff would instead place people alone in cells. In 2020, Human Rights Watch called for the WA government to permanently end the use of prolonged solitary confinement for prisoners, finding some prisoners spent 23 hours a day in solitary confinement. Newhouse said in one instance, staff who held a child in solitary confinement for 300 days were promoted.

“It’s cruel, it’s inhumane and it’s a form of torture — no one has ever come out of solitary confinement better than when they went in,” he said. 

“Money would be better spent on diverting children and adults from the carceral system and providing them wherever possible with the support and care and medical treatment that they need. That would be a much better investment.”