A smaller total increase in the prison population and stability in the imprisonment rate over the 12 months to June 2006 indicate a slowing of the adult imprisonment rate in Australia. The Australian Institute of Criminology's Australian crime: facts and figures uses Australian Bureau of Statistics data to show the rate of adult imprisonment in Australia by sentenced and remanded prisoners. The overall imprisonment rate at 30 June 2006 was 163 prisoners per 100,000 adult population. This increased by more than 20 percent since 1996, but by less than one percent since 30 June 2005. The rate for remanded prisoners more than doubled since 1996, from 17 to 35 per 100,000 adult population, with an increase of six percent per 100,000 in the past 12 months. Although the rate for sentenced prisoners increased by about ten percent between 1996, and 2006, from 117 to 128 per 100,000, it decreased by almost two percent from 130 per 100,000 from June 2005 to June 2006.
Imprisonment in Australia, sentenced and remanded, 1996–2006 (rate per 100,000 adult population) [see attached PDF for graph]
References
- Australian Institute of Criminology 2007. Australian crime: facts and figures 2006. Canberra: Australian Institute of Criminology.