Corrections Victoria Commissioner Emma Cassar. In a frank, exclusive interview, Ms Cassar said her top priority as the state’s prison boss was reducing the female inmate population. She flagged sweeping changes to the management of non-violent female prisoners, including in community settings outside prison. “I can’t go into detail now, but when I can this would be the best news story in the history of women’s corrections,” Ms Cassar said. “The Victorian community is ready for this chat and [it] would be lovely to think we could do something different for women.”

Especially confronting for the Andrews government is the explosion in the number of low-level female offenders on remand, ineligible for bail, unable to get a timely hearing or incapable of meeting conditions for their release such as stable housing. The government forecasts the number of female remandees to rise by almost 60 per cent, overtaking the number of female sentenced prisoners by 2023. Never before has the number of people on remand awaiting the outcome of a criminal proceeding exceeded the number in custody serving a prison sentence after pleading guilty or being found guilty at trial. The growth in prisoner numbers is being driven by a string of changes made under Labor and Coalition governments over the past decade, including alterations to parole, bail and sentencing laws and the recruitment of 3000 new police. Victoria's booming population has also played a role.

Key factors are the toughening of parole after Adrian Bayley raped and murdered Jill Meagher while on parole in 2012, and restrictive new bail laws introduced following the Bourke Street killings by James Gargasoulas in 2017. Ms Cassar said that even short remand stints could be harmful because women were disconnected from their families, children in particular. “When you take a woman and put her in prison you’re not only affecting one life but you’re affecting many lives because most of these women have children or caring responsibilities,” she said. Many female prisoners have been victims of trauma and abuse: a quarter have been homeless, 65 per cent have been a victim of family violence.

Loading The number of Indigenous women incarcerated has soared in particular. The figure is up 240 per cent over the past five years, with Indigenous women now making up 13 per cent of female prisoners. Victoria’s prisons now cost more than $1.6 billion to run, triple the outlay in 2009-10. To pay for the burgeoning numbers, the government in the May budget announced a record $1.8 billion in new capital spending on prison infrastructure for 1600 new beds over four years. Pressure is now mounting on the government to fine tune the bail laws introduced after the 2017 Bourke Street killings. These laws have been fuelling the unprecedented rise in remand numbers and prison spending. Dr Kathryn Daley from RMIT’s school of global urban and social studies said the impact on women was the unintended consequence of five years of law and order debate, policy and legislative change.

“As a general rule, corrections policy is made forgetting that women are part of the corrections system.” Ms Daley said it was necessary and “inevitable” that the bail laws would be revisited because the continuing multibillion-dollar expansion of the prison system could not be sustained. Ms Cassar stopped short of calling for a reform of bail laws. “Any future changes to bail and remand laws are a matter for the Victorian government,” she said. To date the government has resisted calls to revisit bail laws. Instead, Corrections Minister Ben Carroll has flagged a possible reworking of the Corrections Act to focus on prisoner rehabilitation.

The burgeoning expenditure on prisons is also siphoning money away from services that are known to be important in keeping people out of prison – social housing in particular, but also health and education. Elena Campbell is the associate director of research at RMIT’s Centre for Innovative Justice. She said the new bail laws were having a disproportionate effect on women. Loading “We’re seeing particularly high rates of women on remand. They can’t get bail, often because of a lack of social and public housing.

“Some magistrates will say: ‘I know you don’t have anywhere to go, I know it’s not safe for you. So custody is the best option.' ” Ms Cassar acknowledged lack of housing options as a major issue in corrections. “I think housing is an issue for the general public and for our prisoners and offenders it is a real problem.” Both the government and Corrections Victoria are refusing to be drawn on whether a new women’s prison may be on the drawing board after 2023. Of the 1600 new beds funded in the May budget only 106 have been earmarked for the women at the Dame Phyllis Frost prison at Ravenhall.

At the current rate of growth, Corrections Victoria will exceed its planned capacity for housing female prisoners before reaching the end of the government’s four-year forecast period in 2023, leaving a shortfall in beds. “We will always plan for all scenarios, but my absolute hope and passion for the next three years is that we reduce the number of women in custody,” Ms Cassar said. Private prison industry sources have confirmed anticipating new male and female prisons in coming years in regional Victoria.