The Barbados Prison Service is getting into a brand new period of reform, with sweeping initiatives geared toward reworking the nation’s penal system right into a extra sustainable, rehabilitative, and inclusive setting for each inmates and workers.
Throughout a commencement ceremony for brand new recruits, Minister of Residence Affairs Wilfred Abrahams unveiled a collection of upgrades to jail operations, highlighting environmental sustainability, improved workers welfare, and academic alternatives as central to the federal government’s agenda.
Among the many standout tasks is a inexperienced power initiative, developed in partnership with the Barbados Nationwide Oil Firm, to introduce photovoltaic techniques into jail infrastructure. That is complemented by efforts to strengthen meals safety by the growth of the jail farm, together with water sustainability measures that embrace the elevated use of recycled water.
Abrahams additionally outlined plans to modernise the fleet of jail autos, with a phased alternative of fossil gasoline items in favour of hybrid electrical alternate options. Moreover, the jail’s IT techniques will likely be upgraded to enhance operational effectivity and jail administration.
On the coronary heart of the reform package deal is a dedication to rehabilitation and reintegration. “You’d be happy to know that a kind of programmes designed to reinforce the academic alternatives for prisoners can also be going to be open to jail officers as nicely,” Abrahams mentioned. “The place anyone in jail advantages, you get an opportunity to learn as nicely to grow to be your greatest selves.”
He reaffirmed the federal government’s dedication to penal reform, noting that human useful resource wants will likely be prioritized and that alternate options to incarceration and broader felony justice reforms are additionally within the pipeline.
The minister took time to acknowledge the private sacrifices of recent recruits, a lot of whom left jobs and households to finish the intensive 14-week live-in coaching programme. In response, Abrahams introduced that apprenticeship pay for future cohorts can be elevated.
“We settle for that so that you can come right here, a few of you will have jobs, a few of you will have dependents, you will have youngsters. So that you can come and go right into a dwelling programme for 14 weeks, you must depart that behind and take a bet on your self,” he mentioned. “I’ll assist the superintendent of jail in his place to get an elevated stipend for the subsequent batch of recruits.”
Abrahams additionally addressed a longstanding concern throughout the jail ranks—the difficulty of unpaid compensation for 12-hour shifts labored through the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic.
“I additionally want to advise that we’re lastly within the house stretch of the settlement of the 12-hour compensation package deal for individuals who did the 12-hour shifts,” he mentioned. “That has been a bugbear for quite a lot of you for some time and the entire decision of that’s imminent.”
The reforms sign a holistic shift in Barbados’ penal strategy, mixing environmental consciousness with social justice and institutional accountability.
