Ex-prisoners, homelessness and the state in Australia.

• Jurisdiction: Australia
• Author: Baldry, Eileen
• Date: 01 April 2006

Australia, with other OECD countries, has experienced a rapid rise in numbers of prison releasees. With this, there is heightened interest in the social impact of more prisoners returning to the community. International research has consistently indicated that suitable housing is a vital factor in ex-prisoners' social integration. This project investigated whether and to what extent ex-prisoner housing and associated social factors are important to integration in Australia, specifically New South Wales and Victoria, where no reliable prior research on this matter had been done. Analyses indicated significant differences between states; chronic homelessness, poverty and lack of support in the participants' lives; and that accommodation instability is a predictor of return to prison. Justice system policy implications are discussed.

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The social integration of ex-prisoners has become a topic of renewed interest as prisoner numbers in most countries have risen rapidly over the past decade with a concomitant rise in numbers of releasees. High recidivism rates indicate that many ex-prisoners have not benefited from rehabilitative processes during their time in prison and are not successful in the transition back into the community. Housing and other social factors have been shown in international research, as discussed below, to be crucial to successful transition. There is little information available on this matter in Australia. This article reports the findings of the first research project investigating this matter with a consecutive sample of Australian male and female releasees. The association between the iterative homelessness and severe social exclusion experienced by ex-prisoners and reincarceration, as uncovered in this research, provides a powerful critique of the late 20th to early 21st centuries' rush to imprison.

The Australian Context

There were over 23,552 prisoners (sentenced and unsentenced) on census day in Australia in 2003, an increase of 50% over the preceding decade, with approximately 8880 in New South Wales (NSW) and 3760 in Victoria (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2004). By far the majority of full-time prisoners received into the prison system in the two states each year is on a short sentence (that is, under 12 months). They are thus unlikely to be on supervised parole and therefore without established contact or support in the community postrelease. A significant minority serves a long sentence, and is released without parole due to restrictions on the granting of parole for certain categories of prisoners. The census count, though, does not give a realistic picture of the 'flow-through' numbers of prisoners entering and being released from Australian prisons over the period of a year. There are no reliable data on numbers of prisoners being released into the community each year, but the Commonwealth Department of Family and Community Services' (FaCS) estimates suggested in 2001 there were over 43,000 Australia-wide (Andersen, 2001).

In Victoria and NSW, Correctional Services fund or partly fund a very small amount of postrelease support (excluding the Probation and Parole Service), with NSW, for example, directing only 0.3% of its budget to community-based postrelease programs (NSW Department of Corrective Services, 2001). Departments of Housing, Health and Community/Human Services and Centrelink (the social security provider in Australia) are involved in providing services but until 2002 none had clearly defined policy aims and objectives or practices regarding housing for people being released from prison.

A small number of nongovernment organisations (NGOs) provide a limited amount of housing support. At the time of this research (2002-2003) there were about 50 places each in NSW and Victoria designated for ex-prisoners. The Victorian and NSW governments have begun a number of pilot postrelease service initiatives since 2002. Interim findings in Victoria indicate better outcomes for ex-prisoners in these programs compared to those not in such programs (Aktepe & Lake, 2003).

Previous Studies on Ex-Prisoners and Housing

Baldry, McDonnell, Maplestone and Peeters (2003) provided an overview of literature, including Australian work, in this field. They follow Paylor (1995) in suggesting that the international and Australian literature is still characterised by a paucity of studies. There is a lack of empirical studies of housing issues faced by ex-prisoners, and a lack of theoretical insight into the impact of unstable and inappropriate housing on postprison reintegration and associated reincarceration.

Nevertheless, such literature points consistently to a strong association between ex-prisoners, poor accommodation and lack of social integration. A large minority of ex-prisoners does not have suitable accommodation upon release, and it has been argued that structural factors are fundamental to ex-prisoners being able to gain and maintain suitable housing (Banks & Fairhead, 1976; Corden, Kuipers, & Wilson, 1978; Corden & Clifton, 1983; Ramsay, 1986).

Overall, the literature suggests poor prerelease arrangements resulting in inadequate, unsupported accommodation postrelease for many releasees. Those with mental illness or intellectual disability, young unattached males on short sentences and single women with children are particularly vulnerable to poor housing on being released. It is argued that close coordination among agencies and a greater variety of housing types with support, not just ex-prisoner hostels, are required to begin to address postrelease housing problems. (Carlisle, 1996; Carnaby, 1998; Minnesota Department of Corrections, 2001; NACRO, 1992, 1993; Paylor, 1995; Travis, Solomon, & Waul, 2001; Solomon, Waul, Van Ness, & Travis, 2004; UK Cabinet Office Social Exclusion Unit, 2001; UK Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions, Rough Sleepers Unit, 2001).

Literature on Related Issues

Studies into the relationship between social issues and difficulties for prisoners such as homelessness (Benda, 1983; Conway, 1999; De Li, 2000; McCarthy & Hagen, 1991; Stark, 1994; Vitelli, 1993), mental illness/disturbance (Belcher, 1988; Harrington, 1999; NACRO, 1992), intellectual disability (Hayes, 1991, 1996; Lyall et al., 1995; Simpson, Martin, & Green, 2001) and disadvantageous geographical location (Minnesota Department of Corrections, 2001; Vinson, 1999) have indicated a high level of difficulty for these persons in securing suitable accommodation upon release. These studies also indicate that there is a higher rate of incarceration of persons with these problems than in the general population. The factors just discussed, along with others such as unemployment, are interactive with and interdependent upon each other. Similar problems exist for Indigenous Australians (Jonas, 2003) and women, especially sole carers of children and those with a drug problem (NSW Legislative Council, 2001; Slowinski, 2001).

The current provisions for ex-prisoners with particular problems or in minority groups (such as all those groups just mentioned) are reported to be seriously insufficient. This is supported by recent Inquiries and reports in NSW (New South Wales Legislative Council Standing Committee on Law and Justice, 2000; NSW Legislative Council, 2001; NSW Legislative Council, 2002).

The Research Method

The research being reported here gathered data from Australian ex-prisoners about housing and other social matters and their experiences postrelease. Originally, 201 prisoners in NSW and 155 in Victoria were interviewed prerelease after ethics approval had been granted and prisoners from the main releasing prisons, who were about to be released, had volunteered to be participants. Prerelease interviews were conducted over a 3-month period from late 2001 to early 2002. This provided a consecutive sample of prisoners being released from the 14 prisons included in the research. Seven of the original interviewees in NSW and 10 in Victoria subsequently were found to be ineligible, as they were not released when expected. Thus 194 participants (130 male and 64 female) in NSW and 145 (122 male and 23 female) in Victoria--339 in all--were included in the prerelease sample and were followed up postrelease. Subsequent interviews were held at 3, 6 and 9 months postrelease. If the person was back in prison, interviews were held there. At the end of the 9-month interview period, 238 participants--145 in NSW and 93 in Victoria--had been interviewed or had...