Why New Zealand Still Needs More Prisons

In a bid to reduce the cost of dealing with criminals the Government has decided to give judges the option of issuing home detentions for minor criminal offenses.

However, the only proven way of reducing crime rates is to threaten more offenders with imprisonment.

In the United States and Continental Europe, high incarceration rates have led to a significant reduction in crime rates. Conversely, a shortage of prison spaces in Britain and New Zealand is undermining police efforts to get tough in criminals.

New Zealand is one of the toughest places in the world to commit a crime without getting caught, but it also has some of the softest sentencing.

The logic of imprisonment is simple - if criminals are locked up then they can't commit crimes. There is also the deterrence aspect to imprisonment. Although many people argue that prisons are much softer than they used to be, the inmates are still pretty unpleasant. The threat of getting raped in a prison shower (or worse) is always going to make a lot of minor criminals think twice about breaking the law.

While some neo-conservatives question the cost-effectiveness of imprisonment, liberals argue that prison degrades the individual. This may be true, but it depends on your priorities - reducing crime or rehabilitiation. If its the former, then build more prisons.

Ultimately there are only two types of serious penalties - imprisonment or physical punishment. To a criminal, a fine is an empty threat unless a judge is willing and able to send them to prison for not paying one.

Alternative punishments like home detentions may be useful, but only if they are backed up by the threat of stronger penalties. If someone repeatedly breaks the conditions of a home detention then there must be a prison space to which they can be sent.

Just because imprisonment rates are already high does not mean imprisonment doesn't work. Sure, we should be doing more to tackle rising inequality, and inequality is a significant factor in crime rates.

But we can't just go easy on those that have already lapsed into a criminal lifestyle.

In the 1950s when crime rates were at record low levels, society was a lot more egalitarian (in economic terms) but it was also more authoritarian.

Prisons may be unsightly, they may be costly, but they actuallly work - thats why we need more of them and shouldn't moan about paying for them.

The costs of crime are continually being passed onto law-abiding ctitzens through increased taxes, rates, rents and insurance priemiums. Investing in prisons will save taxpayers money in the long run.