The prison riot that didn't need to happen

Saturday, 2 January 2021

Jeremy Lightfoot, chief executive of Corrections talks to the media about a riot at Waikeria Prison.

OPINION: Some of the best people I know have been to prison.

I must also say that some of the best people I know have taken some fairly odd off-road tracks, and tumbled willingly down some pretty dark and nefarious rabbit holes.

Fortunately the end of their travels have found them neither still in jail or stuck down dodgy rabbit holes. They are good people leading arguably noble lives. Let us then establish that, as you go on to read this, I am not anti-prisoner. I am most fiercely anti-violence. I am strictly anti-breaking the law, and I am utterly anti the making, distributing and all the criminal activity that comes along with drugs.

Waikeria inmates are protesting about conditions, and a lack of supplies.

I'm borrowing this from something someone else who eloquently wrote it, and I apologise in advance for not knowing the original source.

Broadcaster, radio personality and writer Polly Gillespie.

* Issues aplenty at Waikeria Prison long before fiery riots

* Sweet home Ōtorohanga, where the house values increase 33.6 per cent

“Surely prison itself is the punishment.”

Prisoners setting fires, and rioting. Sounds very naughty, doesn't it? It sounds like the stuff very naughty bad wicked people would do. I have a rather different take on this whole Waikeria prison stand-off. Very different.

I googled 'Waikeria Prison', and coming up first was a description on the Corrections website that sounded more like a high-end real estate agents cheesy pitch;

“Waikeria Prison is set in a 1200 hectare site near Te Awamutu in the Waikato.” Splendid. Sounds grand.

Prisoners can be seen on the roof of a unit at Waikeria Prison following riots which began on Tuesday.

“Oh I say darling. This place looks terrific. Want to go and stay at Waikeria for the weekend? Looks smashing!”

The truth is that it was built in 1911 three years before the First World War. Several years before the Influenza plague, and long before the discovery of antibiotics.

Parts of Waikeria Prison are condemned. Yes they are busily building new facilities, but meanwhile there are still prisoners in living in 'Pre World War 1 conditions’.

How could prisoners get so angry that they start riots? How could it get to a place where they set their meagre mattresses on fire? Could it be because they didn't get enough loo paper? Did these naughty wicked baddies decide to do it because they were bored or had no phone rights? I don't believe so.

You see this is what I have come to believe. In every institution or government department there are forms. Forms must be filled out. It's red tape. It's the dotting of I's and crossing of T's. In prison the MOST important form is the PC01.

The prisoner complaint form. If a prisoner needs something, has a complaint, runs out of toilet paper, or has any issues that could include anything from denying basic human rights to lack of bog paper, they go to the officers in 'the fish bowl' or the office situated in the middle of the common area. Or they request one from a floor officer. They get delivered one at some stage during that day, complete it. Hand it back and then when it has been lodged by the initial officer, the prisoner gets a receipt. It's stamped and signed. This doesn't mean that the officer who took back the form has seen it. It means it's been officially lodged so people much higher up the food chain see it. Like the PCO. Then in some cases, if the complaint is serious enough, it goes to the Ombudsman. It's a system that ensures prisoners complaints and concerns are not ignored. But if there's no form filled in and lodged, there's no investigation. There is no inquiry. Everything seems perfectly as it should.

Before the riots began, I am told, there was no access to PC01 forms. Although prisoners asked and asked. Without forms they couldn't request simple things like toilet paper. Apparently there are always loads of excuses given to the prisoners about why they can't access forms.

It could be lack of printer ink or the classic “oops I forgot!”. No forms lodged then all is well in prison land apparently.

So when the top dog prison officials have been saying in the news “well we didn't know of any concerns…” or “there was no indication of prisoners going without basic human rights'” they were right. They were right because the only way the prisoners could lodge simple concerns about toilet paper or whatever else, was with the PC01, and if they were not being handed out or lodged, absolutely no concerns were being seen or heard. By anyone. Nothing was lodged. Nothing was done. Plausible denial.

So now it's a massive riot, and prisoners are making weapons, and prison workers are scared, and really all because this is what happens in any society when people with few rights or means are not heard. When people have had enough of being denied human rights, or a bloody form to get toilet paper, if they are ignored long enough they will revolt.

For God’s sake print out some more PC01 forms guys. Prison is the punishment. Having no voice and nothing to wipe your a… with is not part of this country’s way of incarcerating prisoners.

In a statement, the Department of Corrections responded: With regards to complaints from people in prison, there are a number of channels for prisoners to report concerns or make complaints, including through the PC.01 system, the independent Corrections Inspectorate (0800 free call number available to prisoners) or the Office of the Ombudsman. These channels are free for any prisoner to contact, with contact details readily available to individuals.