Junee Mayor Bob Callow… “If they’d have told us that much sooner, that this is all that it was, then we wouldn’t have been too worried about it.
Two historic Goulburn prison wings (dating to the late 1800s) are shortly going to be retired, including ageing facilities at Silverwater Women’s Correctional Centre.
The affected wings have been in use for more than 140 years and are no longer meeting modern safety standards for inmates and guards alike.
Goulburn isn’t a stranger to closures, after two wings were shut down in 2024 following a decrease in numbers during the COVID period. Those numbers have since increased with the Government catching up on domestic violence cases.
The inmates (several of whom are considered supermax prisoners) from the closed wings will be moved to other areas within NSW, including Junee’s Correctional Centre.
There are currently 170 inmates preparing for the move in September this year.
For Goulburn staff, the changes mean a disruption of generational work within the community.
More than 130 jobs are expected to be affected (by either relocation or redundancy) by staff at the Goulburn facility.
Prison workers, their families and other members of the Goulburn community gathered in Bellmore Park on May 1st in a stand to prevent the closures of the two wings.
In Junee, the local community was not alerted to the sudden influx of prisoners or the staff they would receive in September until it had already been agreed upon.
At the time, Junee Mayor Bob Callow said he was disappointed with the lack of notice from the NSW Government.
“Junee is a state-of-the-art facility, and I’m pretty sure they can handle those sorts of inmates. What the jail does internally is their business; it has nothing to do with Council, so I’ve got no worries or concerns there,” he had said.
“The one thing that does concern me is that if we’d have had a bit more notice about this sort of thing, or even if we were given a heads up to say this is likely to happen, we could have engaged our real estate agents and builders and developers and said, ‘look, this is likely to happen’ and get some housing developments underway.”
It was predicted that 85 prisoners were expected to be relocated to the Junee facilities, along with the relevant correctional officers.
As of May 4th, these details have changed.
“There’s only an overflow coming to Junee and they’re only going into spaces that are already there,” he says.
“The jail is not at capacity at the moment, so any influx from the Goulburn facility will just be going into beds that are already there.”
Admittedly, Mayor Callow says, he is still disappointed that he wasn’t alerted earlier about the arrangements.
“If they’d have told us that much sooner, that this is all that it was, then we wouldn’t have been too worried about it,” he says.
The inmates are expected to be spread across the region, with Junee only taking what they can handle. It is currently unknown how many correctional guards and their families will be making the move to the community.
“There may not be an increase in guards coming to town than we had thought, and perhaps our housing strategy at this time might cope,” says Mayor Callow.
“But that would have been nice to know some months ago.”
In Goulburn, residents and workers continue to fight against the closures, with several guards’ families working in emergency services and other vital community services. Fears that relocation or redundancy of prison staff could have a snowball effect, causing significant gaps in emergency workers.
Member for Goulburn, the Hon. Wendy Tuckerman MP, has endorsed calls to stop the proposed closure of parts of the Goulburn Correctional Centre. She has since created an ePetition and hopes to collect 20,000 signatures to see the debate in Parliament.
The petition calls on the Government to halt closure plans, “consult meaningfully”, release the data and justification behind the proposal, protect all jobs affecting, keep the Centre fully operational during consultation, properly assess alternatives to closure and recognise the potential economic impact on residents within Goulburn and the surrounding region.
To sign, it is a legal requirement to be a resident of NSW.
“This facility is a critical part of our regional community – supporting local jobs, families, small businesses and essential services in Goulburn and beyond,” she says.
Updates on whether this outcome may change are expected to be provided in the coming months.
Elizabeth Kovacs
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