Imprisonment In Australia

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The issue and the relevant legislation Imprisonment is not effective in preventing crime. Sentencing Act 1989 (NSW) The current situation Offenders of the legal system are being incarcerated and expected to rehabilitate during their time in prison. The Australian community currently pays $32 billion per year to maintain this method of crime prevention. This translates into $60 000 per person in gaol, per year In the past 12 years the Australian prison population has doubled. More prisons are being built and disused ones are being brought back into use. Minimum and maximum sentences have been set by the Australian government for a variety of crimes, which judges must abide by. Arguments for and against the issue For: The…show more content…
Prison time may be no worse for some people than the way they already live and therefore ineffective as a form of deterrence. People who cannot afford legal support have very minimal access to the legal system. An innocent person may be incarcerated only because they could not afford a suitable legal defence, this along with the theory of “school of crime” means that law abiding members of the community will become criminals through a forced exposure to real criminals. Instead of reducing future crime and recidivism, imprisonment is actually creating more offenders from once law-abiding citizens. The principle basis for a mandatory minimum sentence is the belief that the length of time in prison is a deterrent to future recidivism. However, longer exposure to other offenders can make an individual more likely to recidivate and therefore the longer sentence is developing criminality instead of preventing…show more content…
Judges need more discretionary power, as imprisonment is not effective in rehabilitating all offenders. Parliaments should have less influence on the administration of justice. Politicians are wholly concerned with winning votes and decisions they make might be popular with the majority of society but they can be detrimental to the process of rehabilitating offenders, and reducing chances of future recidivism. The legislature should be able to pass laws against any act or omission of duty that results in harm to society but leave the interpretation and application of those laws to judiciary, which is concurrent with the Separation of Powers Doctrine. Judges should be able employ other methods if they feel that they will be more successful. Victims’ Lobbies should have less influence on the administration of justice. All people sympathise with the victim, but no matter how badly they have been wronged they should have no influence on the outcome of a sentence, or on anybody responsible for any of the decision making. A key principle of Natural Justice is an impartial judge and allowing victims to have any affect on decision-makers is a fundamental breech of Natural

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