Reprinted from The Common Good, no 4, Pentecost 1997
Prisons: An Anachronism that Destroys Lives
Dr Pita R Sharples
Prison is a place where we send people because we abdicate our responsibility to deal with their dilemma. We isolate them for 2, 5, 7, 10 years and then suddenly we release them back amongst us as if they had been cured Ñ as if prison has some magical treatment which has transformed these people to be OK amongst us now. We must believe this, or why do we so overwhelmingly, unequivocally, and, dare I say it, enthusiastically, endorse this prison system?
We paint an international portrait of a clean, green image. We love to say weÕre nuclear free. We boast excellence in sport and fair play in the world arena. We have led the world in areas of social reform and human rights. We march and demonstrate to preserve a 180 year old building. We flock to the seaside to save a stranded whale. So why do we lock people up, to rot together, regardless of their respective crimes, regardless of the environment which by its punitive structure and culture, negates any real prospect of positive habilitation.
I propose to establish a Habilitation Centre for persons convicted of crimes. I propose an intervention into the current prison system. I propose an institution which is Ôuser friendlyÕ to all participants Ñ both those who go home at night and those who must remain. The philosophies to be applied to the life and goals of the institution are derived from Maori knowledge and are closely allied to those philosophies which have created a new schooling option for New Zealand called Kura Kaupapa Maori Ñ of which there are now 53 such schools with 30 more awaiting designation. Kura Kaupapa Maori is a school type and is itself an intervention into a mainstream schooling system within which too many Maori students were failing. It boasts incredible successes.
The habilitation centre that I propose will house 60-90 offenders. The control of all programs will be vested in the whanau. The whanau will be established and drawn from three groups. These groups are (1) the staff of the centre, (2) the inmates, (3) the community whanau from outside the prison. These three groups will assume responsibility for the entire project. A charter will be drawn up where each faction will include their Ônot negotiablesÕ and then the institution will be built, roles defined, staff selected and trained, inmates selected, and so on.
Overriding the entire operation will be a philosophy for life. The emphasis will be on total habilitation of the inmate with his/her community. The aim will be for each and every inmate to walk out of the centre at the end of his/her term into a job, programme, home situation which has already been negotiated and established during the sentencing period.
Principal staff will be healers, educators/trainers and field workers. Security will be more psychological than physical. A code of behaviour will be agreed upon by the community whanau, staff and inmates. Violation of this code or kaupapa will result in exclusion from the programme. The daily life, timetables, gardens, programmes, rest times, and private times will be decided together by the centre whanau.
The centre will help the inmate set goals and then go about achieving those goals. All inmates must agree to abide by the whanau operations, the kaupapa or philosophies and to observe the charter of rules for living. The centreÕs out-work staff will establish contact with the inmatesÕ real family and where appropriate with the victimÕs family or aggrieved party. Again the emphasis will be on healing.
Principal staff will be healers, educators/trainers and field workers. Security will be more psychological than physical. A code of behaviour will be agreed upon by the community whanau, staff and inmates.
The centre will have no bad guys or good guys, just people working and helping each other to assume or resume a normal but empowered lifestyle. Some of those people in the whanau will go home at night, others must stay. The able will assist the unable whether staff, community or inmate. The centre will be a happy place with every occupant contributing to the good of others. The kaupapa will be accepted by all and will provide the mandate for anyone to be involved in the project.
Communications with the outside community will be at a maximum. Employers will be enlisted to meet and maybe train prospective employees from the inmates. Inmates will visit their chosen vocation and adjust to their new working environment prior to sentence completion.
So there you have it. The goal of the habilitation centre: a recidivism rate of nil percent. I am advocating that this centre be established. And that the operation be carried out by the finances of the Department of Corrections. Government cannot abdicate their responsibility in this matter Ñ I do not want this to be a private enterprise. Those who have the role of dispensing justice must also take responsibility for what has been dispensed.
Dr Pita Sharples, of Ngati Kahungunu, Ngati Te Kiri o Te Rangi and Ngata Pahau Wera is chairperson of Hoani Waititi Marae.