Thousands of prison officers across New South Wales have been ordered to return to work after walking off the job over the sentence handed to a prisoner who bashed four guards at Cessnock Correctional Complex.<\/p>\n
Lawyers for Corrective Services NSW and the Public Service Association\u00a0(PSA) attended an urgent hearing on Thursday before the Industrial Relations Commission in a bid to resolve the situation.<\/p>\n
Warning: This story contains graphic details and imagery.<\/p>\n
The commission ordered more than 5,000 correctional services employees to cease their industrial action by 6am on Friday.<\/p>\n
Union members will also no longer be able to organise further strike action in relation to the man’s sentencing.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The PSA said the action stemmed from a three-year sentence, to be served in the community, handed to Cameron Welsh in Cessnock Local Court on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
Welsh, 26, was convicted of four counts of assaulting a law enforcement officer and inflicting actual bodily harm.<\/p>\n
He was also convicted of one count of stalking and intimidating a prison guard, causing fear of physical harm.<\/p>\n
The community corrections order (CCO) is in lieu of full-time jail, and PSA general secretary Stewart Little said his members were appalled.<\/p>\n
“He seriously assaulted four officers, all requiring hospitalisation, and two of those officers will never work again,” Mr Little said.<\/p>\n
Prison officers were injured at Cessnock Correctional Complex. (Supplied)<\/p>\n
Welsh has a history of violence, and in 2021 was arrested for bashing two men with a baseball bat at Woodberry in the Hunter.<\/p>\n
He was given a backdated sentence in 2023 of six years, with a non-parole period of three years.<\/p>\n
But parole was revoked three months after his release, after he allegedly threatened a relative.<\/p>\n
After the February attacks in Cessnock prison, he was moved to the state’s most secure prison, Goulburn’s “Supermax”, where he remains.<\/p>\n
NSW inmates placed into immediate lockdown<\/p>\n
Giving evidence to the commission on Thursday afternoon, Assistant Commissioner at the Department of Communities and Justice Craig Smith said the effect of the strike had been “catastrophic”.<\/p>\n
Assistant Commissioner Smith said some correctional centres, which usually have about 50 to 60 staff working on shift at a time, were now operating with only six people.<\/p>\n
“Most of them [prison guards] won’t get to go home now for the next 48 hours \u2026 we don’t have anyone that can relieve them,” Assistant Commissioner Smith said.<\/p>\n
The assistant commissioner told the commission all inmates across the state were placed into immediate lockdown, which could send prisoners “wild”.<\/p>\n
“It puts the staff at great harm that are actually still at the centre still working,” he said.<\/p>\n
“If someone [an inmate] is trying to [self-] harm\u2026 we just don’t have the staff to go and respond at this time.”<\/p>\n
Assistant Commissioner Smith said the action had already had an impact on the court system and that “effectively no inmates will go to court tomorrow” due to inmate transport officers also on strike.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The action stems from an assault at Cessnock Correctional Complex earlier this year. (ABC News: Nakita Jager )<\/p>\n
He also said the union did not provide Corrective Services NSW any notice of its plans to take industrial action before workers walked off the job this morning.<\/p>\n
The commission heard most prison administration staff had also walked off the job in solidarity with guards.<\/p>\n
Jurors in a Sydney trial were told to go home and return on Monday as an “operational situation for the court makes it impossible for us to reconvene tomorrow”.<\/p>\n
Mr Little said many prison officers expected Welsh would have received an additional custodial term.<\/p>\n
“These officers suffered horrific injuries, and basically, this inmate has received a slap on the wrist and no extra jail term,” he said.I understand staff are angry: minister<\/p>\n
The strike action stems from the sentence given to an inmate who bashed four correctional officers. (ABC News: David Marchese)<\/p>\n
Justice Minister Anoulack Chanthivong said he welcomed the decision to resume work.<\/p>\n
“Corrective Services NSW will write to the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions seeking an appeal of the sentence for the inmate in question,” he said.<\/p>\n
Minister Chanthivong said corrections staff were valued and deserved to be safe on the job.<\/p>\n
“The government values the hard work of correctional officers, often in difficult and hostile circumstances,” he said.<\/p>\n
“Correctional officers deserve to be safe on the job.<\/p>\n
“While I understand staff are angry, a decision of the independent judiciary is not a basis for industrial action.”<\/p>\n
He said during the strike correctional facilities remained secure and were “being operated by a reduced number of staff”.<\/p>\n
Ahead of the commission’s ruling, opposition spokesperson Damien Tudehope described the industrial action as a potential “powder keg” situation.<\/p>\n
“You lock prisoners down for 48 hours, that is a recipe for absolute disaster,” Mr Tudehope said.<\/p>\n
“The fact that the government did not know it was coming or allowed it to occur is an indictment on their industrial strategy.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Thousands of prison officers across New South Wales have been ordered to return to work after walking off…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":250453,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[24278,148680,43,148682,148679,148683,2732,44,148681,27994,41,39,42,40],"class_list":{"0":"post-250452","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-assault","9":"tag-cessnock-correctional-complex","10":"tag-headlines","11":"tag-industrial-action-over-sentencing","12":"tag-inmate","13":"tag-inmate-assaults-prison-guards","14":"tag-jail","15":"tag-news","16":"tag-prison-guards-strike","17":"tag-public-service-association","18":"tag-top-news","19":"tag-top-stories","20":"tag-topnews","21":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250452","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=250452"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250452\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/250453"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=250452"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=250452"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=250452"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}