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House of Assembly - Fifty-Second Parliament, Second Session (52-2)
2012-06-13 Daily Xml
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PRISON CONDITIONS

Mr HAMILTON-SMITH (Waite) (14:47): My question is again to the Minister for Health and Ageing. When did he first become aware of the circumstances facing a female prisoner with mental health issues left handcuffed to a bed for 20 hours a day for nine months and a mentally ill Aboriginal man forced to stay in dirty nappies for up to 20 hours a day over 10 months at the Yatala Labour Prison, and what action did he take and when?

The Hon. J.D. HILL (Kaurna—Minister for Health and Ageing, Minister for Mental Health and Substance Abuse, Minister for the Arts) (14:48): I thank the member for the question. My knowledge of these cases occurred in the same way that I imagine the member for Waite's knowledge occurred—through the media. I was not aware of these individual cases prior to the discussion of them in the media.

The member's question in relation to the woman contained an assertion that this woman was a mental health patient (I forget the descriptor he used) with mental health problems; that is, I am told, arguable. I am not a clinician and there are no trained psychiatrists that I know of in this room, but the advice to me as recently as an hour ago from the head of our mental health department, and the Chief Psychiatrist, and the head of forensic mental health at James Nash (a forensic mental health facility) is that this woman has been assessed on a large number of occasions; in fact, she is assessed every—

Mr Hamilton-Smith: It's her fault; is that what you're saying?

The SPEAKER: Member for Unley, order!

The Hon. J.D. HILL: No, it's his neighbour. I've got to protect the member for Unley on this occasion—a rare one, but I would do that. The advice to me from the clinicians is that this woman has what is called borderline personality disorder, and her behaviour, to a large extent, is under her—

Mr Hamilton-Smith interjecting:

The Hon. J.D. HILL: Well, it is an interesting question that the member asks, but let me go back one step. The woman was charged with an offence; I think it was burning down a building—

The Hon. J.M. Rankine: Arson.

The Hon. J.D. HILL: Arson. She went to court. She was not held by the court to be unsuitable for pleading, so she was fit to plead. I am not sure how the court case was held, but she was obviously fit for pleading. She was convicted of an offence and she was sentenced to a period in gaol. She is now in prison. Since she has been in prison, I understand she has committed a number of other offences which have extended her sentence. She is in the prison system as a result of the courts deciding that she was fit to plead.

There is a possibility, of course, that somebody in a prison may develop a mental illness which could cause them to go to James Nash House if they are required to. Can I assure you, and all the members of this house and all the media who are following this, if this woman needed to be put into James Nash House, she would be. She has been there in the past. She was there as recently as May and then she was determined to be suitable to be returned to the prison environment where she is serving a sentence.

Whatever mental illness she may have, the clinicians tell me it is not appropriate for her to be in a mental health bed in James Nash House. She is not in the same category as other prisoners or other mental health patients who have not been able to plead who are also in James Nash House. I do not overturn clinical advice. If I were to say to the clinicians that this woman should be placed in that facility rather than this facility, I imagine the howl of protest would be enormous. What kind of state would we be living in where a minister was to decide who would be locked up in a forensic mental health facility? It is not my call.

I can tell you that I challenged these departmental officers who gave the advice. I put the arguments that you are probably trying to put to me that surely somebody who has these characteristics is mentally unwell and should be in such a facility, but to all these arguments the same answer came back, 'No, she should not be in a mental health bed at James Nash House; she is not in that category of person.' Whether or not she has mental illness is, I guess, something that people will have a view of. What she has is borderline personality disorder which, as I understand it, is not generally considered to be a mental illness in itself.

There are people in our community who behave well and there are people in our community who behave poorly. We do not put all the poorly behaved people in mental health facilities. As a schoolteacher—and I know there are former teachers in this place—I used to have a classroom of kids, some of whom behaved beautifully and some of whom behaved poorly. We did not lock up the ones who behaved poorly in mental health facilities. We sometimes punished them, but we did not put them in a mental health facility, and the same is true in the broader community

Members interjecting:

The SPEAKER: Order! Thank you, minister.

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