Plan B Forum

The ACT Government wants to introduce a tattooing service for prisoners at the territory's jail.

Chief Minister Katy Gallagher says the use of makeshift, contraband tattoo guns and needles by prisoners could be a greater infection risk at the jail than intravenous drug use.

Ms Gallagher said she believed a safe, professional tattooing service could be more effective in stopping the spread of blood-borne disease at the Alexander Maconochie Centre than the stalled needle-and-syringe program.

Determined opposition by the prison's guards and their union, the CPSU, has blocked a needle exchange scheme at the jail, but Ms Gallagher said yesterday she had not given up in her efforts to control blood-borne diseases at the AMC.

The union cautiously welcomed the safe tattooing plan yesterday and suggested it could be extended to provide a safe body-piercing service.

Ms Gallagher said that a safe, professional tattoo service would be part of the solution but she also flagged moves to make prison staff more accountable in the control of blood-borne viruses among inmates.

The Government cites reports by prisons expert Keith Hamburger, virology research centre the Burnett Institute and former health minister Michael Moore that all recommended a safe tattooing facility to control the spread of HIV and hepatitis.

The Burnett report found that 40per cent of the prison's tattooed inmates had been given some of their tattoos by fellow inmates while behind bars.

Ms Gallagher, who is also Health Minister, told The Canberra Times that it was time to act.

''We know there are tattoo guns, some have been confiscated,'' she said. ''We know that the dirty needles often used for tattoos transmit blood-borne viruses and we know that the rates of those viruses are very high in the jail.

''It's not the only answer but it could be part of the answer.''

There were issues to be managed, Ms Gallagher said, such as who would operate the service, whether it would be free and the problem of prisoners using tattoos to identify themselves as gang members.


http://www.canberratimes.com.au/news/lo ... 71566.aspx

'No way' says union
...

The Union of Canadian Correctional Officers doesn't need any time decide.

"No way, shape or form would the corrections officers, or the union, agree to a needle exchange," said union president Sylvain Martel. He said with more needles in prisons, more officers will be poked.

Likewise, he disapproves of the tattoo project and its $3 million price tag.

"That's taxpayers' money. In the 1990s, the big thing was to de-tattoo someone," said Martel, who added the costly effort was meant to help prisoners reintegrate into society.

"Now, we're going to pay for them to be tattooed and a month before their release we're going to have them de-tattooed. They say it will reduce the infectious disease inside (the prison), which is bullshit, bologna."

Tattoos said to fuel gangs

Martel said his biggest objection to the tattoo project is that it will perpetuate gang activity in the prisons. Often esoteric tattoos are used to identify gang members, he said, and the inmate giving the tattoos would also be under pressure not to tattoo members of rival gangs.

He is also concerned that both the needles in the exchange and the tattoo needles will find their way in the general prison population.

Pilon-Santilli said since the tattooing is done in a controlled environment, than there is no way the needles will find their way into the general population. But Martel said medical syringes are often stolen under similar circumstances from prison medical services.


More

Contrary to what Martel predicts, none of the European prisons using needle exchange programs reported those needles being used in attacks. In fact, in Germany, the program was cancelled when the government changed hands. Prison guards in that country protested because they realized how much safer the exchange program made the prisons, he said.

Miles wrote:They are, after all, in jail where correct me if I am wrong punishment is the object of the exercise.

Scooter wrote:Prison guards exist to follow policy, not to set it.

The Union of Canadian Correctional Officers launched a national campaign Tuesday to draw attention to the dangers they face on the job. The union has spent more than 75 days over the past two years in contract negotiations with the federal government since its contract expired. The campaign is being used to draw attention to their concerns about safety, management, pensions, and the proliferation of weapons in federal prisons.

Why Ottawa rubbed out jail tattoo program
The Leader-Post

Your readers deserve to get the full picture as to why our government discontinued the initiative to set up tattoo parlours in our corrections facilities ("Gov't report contradicts Day's assertion", Jan. 16 edition of the Leader-Post.)

Canadians were surprised to learn that taxpayers' dollars were paying for tattoo parlours for convicted criminals. So was I. Unlike the Liberals, Canada's new
government does not believe that spending taxpayers' money on providing tattoos for convicted criminals is an effective use of public money. Like all Canadians, inmates
must take responsibility for their own health. At the same time, our government continues to support education initiatives that the Correctional Service of Canada (CSC) has put in place in order to educate inmates about the dangers of illicit tattooing.

I would also like to note that the CSC commissioner recommended that we close the six pilot sites for the tattoo project and that UCCO (Correctional Officers Union) called the program "a waste of money" and a "band-aid solution." UCCO also predicted that the program would result in our correctional officers being assaulted with tattooing
needles. The Canadian Taxpayer's Federation cited the $700,000 program in its annual "Teddy's Awards" for government waste. Canadian Crime Victim Foundation chairman Joe Wamback called the program "lunacy."

As well, I toured institutions where the tattoo pilot project was practised and saw first-hand that this program was not an effective use of taxpayers' dollars. Our decision to not provide tattoos for convicted criminals was also based on the draft evaluation report prepared by CSC, which failed to conclusively determine that the health and safety of staff members, inmates and the general public would be protected by maintaining this program.

Even prisoners' rights advocate Jim Motherall, a former inmate and HIV/AIDS advocate, said that the tattoo program "was set to fail." Our new government believes in using resources as Canadians would want us to. That means focusing our resources on tackling crime and crime prevention.

Stockwell Day
Day is Canada's minister of public safety.
Ottawa
© The Leader-Post (Regina) 2007



Ending prison tattoo project was correct decision

27 January 2007
Kingston Whig-Standard Re: Dr. John Ford's letter "Prison tattoo pilot projects helped fight disease" (Jan. 23).
Dr. Ford's letter got one thing right: his statement that the prison tattoo program "was not set up with the intent to provide numerical evidence of harm reduction." In fact, when I attended a briefing session in Ottawa on the tattoo project, it became obvious that the project was going to be judged a success no matter what.

loCAtek wrote:Setting policy is what unions do

Scooter wrote: Would you rather pay $50 for a prisoners tattoo or $25,000 a year for the rest his life for AIDS meds?

The Canadian Taxpayer's Federation cited the $700,000 program in its annual "Teddy's Awards" for government waste.

Canada is also looking into whether to hand out clean needles to injection-drug using inmates. CSC and PHAC have signed an agreement to analyze the risks and benefits of a prison-based needle exchange program. Officials from the two agencies, along with representatives from the Union of Canadian Correctional Officers and the Professional Institute of Public Service, traveled to Germany and Spain in September to look at such programs there.