Each edition contains news articles and investigative pieces. These are topical stories that are usually about prisons and criminal justice.
We also summarise the latest criminal justice news around the country.
There are no nation-wide policies or guidelines for managing extreme heat in Australian prisons, or for the regular measurement of temperatures within prison buildings and cells.
While for the most part calls to mobiles are becoming cheaper, we clearly still have a long way to go.
Should going to prison mean never being allowed to hug your partner or child? Is denying physical contact a just punishment, or does it harm families and human dignity? And what do human rights have to say about it?
Including seven children escaping youth detention in Tasmania, two men being charged over prison murder in Queensland, a coroner pushing for bans on spit hoods in prison in the Northern Territory and more.
An Ombudsman investigation has found people in Canberra’s only prison paid nearly $125,000 to make phone calls across two years when this should have been free.
Spit hoods have been found to be ineffective and potentially deadly. But they’re still used in prisons around the country.
A remote WA prison holding mostly First Nations people is “unfit for purpose”, with people sleeping on the floors and cockroach infestations.
A number of Victorian prisons may have to be renovated or rebuilt after the Supreme Court found that no “open air” was being provided to inmates in multiple units.
The Liberal Queensland government has announced plans to significantly minimise the rights to vote for people in prison.
The death of a 16-year-old First Nations teenager in a notorious youth unit of an adult prison in Western Australia was preventable and predictable, and the result of “serious longstanding deficiencies in the system, a Coroner has found.
End-of-life care, also known as palliative care, is a healthcare process that aims to improve the quality of life and reduce the suffering of those who are terminally ill. Being incarcerated can make this stage of life even more complicated.
Including a Victorian man suing for his right to have Vegemite in prison, a new framework for rehabilitation being launched by NT Corrections, a QLD Watchdog calling separation rooms in youth prisons ‘inhumane’ and more.
Obtaining information from federal agencies is about to become subject to stricter rules under the Freedom of Information Amendment Bill 2025 (Cth).
In early December, the United Nations (UN) Working Group on Arbitrary Detention visited Australia. Their purpose was to provide guidance on how international human rights standards apply to prisons and places of detention.
“It is our assessment that Victoria Police did not comply with the Surveillance Devices Act when installing and maintaining integrated listening devices,” the report said.
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