Self Care Units teach prisoners independent living skills by:
- Providing an intermediate step between the prison environment and life in the community by placing individual prisoners in a flatting type situation with three of their peers.
- Getting them to take responsibility for their living arrangements with their peers.
- Enabling them to take control of their day-to-day living needs, including housekeeping, cooking, budgeting and purchasing of food and household requirements.
Eligibility
To be admitted to a Self Care Unit, prisoners must:
- Have a minimum security classification.
- Be drug free.
- Have had no serious misconducts in the preceding six months.
- Be within approximately one year of their release date.
Prisoner obligations
Prisoners must sign a contract agreeing to comply with self-care unit conditions. In addition they must:
- Remain drug free.
- Behave in a responsible and cooperative manner.
- Complete any structured programme required by their sentence plan and work actively towards the community reintegration objectives in that plan.
Self Care Unit features
- Eight sites - Arohata Prison, Auckland Region Women's Corrections Facility, Christchurch Prison, Christchurch Women's Prison, Hawkes Bay Prison, Northland Region Corrections Facility, Rimutaka Prison and Wanganui Prison.
- Some prisoners with babies may be eligible to live in Self Care Units at Arohata Prison, Christchurch Women's Prison and the Auckland Regional Women's Corrections Facility under the mother-child placement option.
- Prisoners can be temporarily released into the community for paid employment including self employment. Prisoners, under supervision, may be temporarily released to do household shopping for themselves and others in their self-care unit.
