Equality Tasmania has praised the Tasmanian Government for confirming that its policies allowing trans women in women’s prisoners will remain in place.
The clarification comes after The Australian newspaper published an article announcing a change in policy.
Yesterday’s edition of the Australian newspaper said “the state government has banned trans-identifying male prisoners from women’s prisons” in response to a decision not to allow a trans-identifying inmate convicted of child abuse into the women’s prison.
They quoted Attorney-General and Corrections Minister Guy Barnett as saying, ““The presence of any male prisoner in a women’s prison would present unacceptable safety risks to female prisoners.”
But today’s Hobart Mercury cites Barnett, as having “rejected claims the government had banned transgender inmates from serving time in women’s prisons”.
Barnett said his decision is consistent with current guidelines which allow “transgender, transsexual and intersex prisoners the right to be housed in a correctional facility appropriate to their gender identification.”
This comes after a call from Equality Tasmania for the State Government to clarify its position and recommit to its existing policy.
Transgender community advocate, Martine Delaney, said it was good to see the policy was not being changed.
“It is great to see that Tasmania retains the same policy it has had since 2009 and that it has not reversed this policy due to an exceptional case reported wrongly in one newspaper.”
“The real threat to women in prison is to trans women being housed in men’s facilities as was tragically highlighted by the case of trans woman, Marjorie Harwood, who was gang raped in Tasmania’s male prison where she was wrongly incarcerated. Marjorie died after refusing medical treatment for a congenital condition rather than be returned to the male prison.”
“I’d like to think the memory of Marjorie is helping decision-makers focus on what is really at stake here.”
Equality Tasmania spokesperson, Rodney Croome, also welcomed the decision.
“This shows the Tasmanian Government is responding to the needs of vulnerable Tasmanians.”
“In the last few weeks there have been interstate attacks on Tasmania’s school curricula, library policies and prisoner policies, all for taking the needs of trans and gender diverse people into account.”
“As a Tasmanian, I am proud none of these attacks have changed any of our state’s sensible, reasonable, inclusive and equitable policies.”
Despite the 2009 policy allowing Marjorie Harwood to be kept in a female facility, she was wrongly held in the male facility. The State Government is developing a new policy involving a Gender Oversight Panel to ensure this does not happen again.
Debate over the housing of transgender inmates has intensified in recent months and the Northern Territory changed its policy in October. Chief Minister Lia Finocchiaro announced her policy change via The Australian. “There should be no men in women’s prisons, full stop,” she told the newspaper.
The Chief Minister’s announcement was in response to a campaign from activist group Women’s Forum Australia who have written to each state leader calling for a strict rule on the housing of inmates who are transgender.
The group has highlighted a claim from a 29-year-old woman who alleges she was sexually assaulted by a transgender prison while incarcerated in a South Australian facility in 2019.
Yesterday they staged a protest on the steps of the South Australian parliament which was led by former federal Liberal MP Nicole Flint.
Flanked by representatives from Australian Women’s Forum Flint called for the South Australian government to change their policy.
“If Premier Peter Malinauskas does not act in parliament today to protect the safety of all women, but particularly women who are incarcerated in jail, to protest them from biological men, then all South Australians should know that they cannot trust a word the premier says when it comes to women’s safety.” Flint said.
South Australian federal Liberal member Tony Pasin commented on the issue during an appearance on the Credlin program on Sky News.
“Women serving custodial sentences shouldn’t be forced to share a jail cell with a man.” Pasin said, describing it as a substantive issue for South Australian voters.
