Australia lacks vital prison data: report

The absence of basic public information on the number of prisoners moving through the Australian correctional system is unacceptable, according to a new report released on Thursday.

Despite more than 2.25 billion U.S. dollars being spent on Australian prisons each year, no data on how many Australians are imprisoned and released each year is available to the public.

Instead, the Australian Bureau of Statistics, releases reports that provide snapshots of the population numbers and characteristics on the first day of each month.

That needs to change, said Alex Avery and Stuart Kinner from the University of Melbourne, and the single-day snapshots under- represent those on shorter terms, leading to misdirected funding and less-than-ideal support services.

"In other large, state-based systems such as public hospitals and schools, accurate throughput data are readily available to the general public," Kinner said in a press statement on Thursday.

"Yet, despite a recurring public investment of more than 3 billion Australian dollars a year, equivalent data are not available for Australia's correctional systems. This has to change. "

Using New South Wales data and applying it to the whole country, the pair estimated 38,500 prisoners left Australian prisons in 2013, which is 25 percent higher than the statistics agency's figure of 30,750 presented as the average daily population.

Ewen said if the state and federal government was serious about closing the gap between Indigenous Australians and the average population, it needed accurate and public data to properly understand how many people cycle through prison.

"We know that every time someone is released from prison, their risk of preventable death increases," Ewen said. Endi