23 July 2015

Green Party questioning of Lotu-Iiga reveals more SERCO failures

The Government should not renew SERCO’s contract to run Mt Eden Prison, following confirmation from the Corrections Minister today that SERCO has been fined $300,000 for a myriad of failures in the last financial year.

“In response to my question in Parliament, Sam Lotu-Iiga admitted that SERCO has already been fined $300,000,” said Green Party corrections spokesperson David Clendon.

“Sam Lotu-liga said SERCO was on notice, but that’s not good enough.

“Prisoners have lost their lives under SERCO’s management, there have been riots, assaults, fight clubs and manufacturing of contraband. Does the prison have to burn down before the Minister acts?

“It’s time for the Government to admit its private prison experiment has been a failure.

“It is unfathomable that the Minister has only put SERCO on notice now, despite SERCO being financially penalised for insufficient staffing, mixing accused prisoners, minimum entitlements and failure in incident notification over the last year.

“Every day we are receiving new information that shows the privatisation of our prisons is a failed experiment.

“SERCO’s management of Mt Eden has failed and yet they are being allowed to make profit off a failing model,” said Mr Clendon.

ends

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