Opposition to the Liberal Government's flawed maximum security prison proposal in Westbury is growing by the day.
The highly respected former Secretary of Justice who oversaw the major expansion of Risdon Prison, Peter Hoult, has said the Hodgman Government's plan to build a maximum security prison at Westbury is "verging on insanity".
"To believe a service infrastructure can be maintained to properly support a maximum and medium inmate prison in a rural setting 30 kilometres out of Launceston is verging on insanity." – Peter Hoult, The Mercury, November 13
Shadow Corrections Minister, Ella Haddad, said its time the Liberal Government listened to the advice of experts and local community members and abandoned its plans to build a maximum security prison at Westbury.
"Opposition to the Liberal Government's flawed maximum security prison proposal in Westbury is overwhelming," Ms Haddad said.
"Mr Hoult's comments have made it clear that the Department of Justice has already done a lot of work to assess suitable sites for a northern prison.
"The Liberals must come clean on whether they disregarded departmental advice when they decided Westbury was best place to put a maximum security prison.
"People in the Westbury community are distressed and they deserve a Government that will genuinely listen to them and not waste hundreds of thousands of dollars on tokenistic consultation gestures, conduct dodgy telephone surveys, and ignore the advice of experts.
"The Hodgman Government must release all departmental advice received so that the public can understand if the decision was based on solid evidence.
"It's time the Liberal Government abandoned its plans to build a maximum security prison at Westbury."
Ella Haddad MP
Shadow Corrections Minister
