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The Victorian government is reopening the controversial Malmsbury Youth Justice Centre two years after shutting the facility down. The government said the facility would reopen to house young people held under new bail laws which came into effect earlier this year. An initial 30 beds at the facility will be opened and 114 staff will be recruited, with the operation of the centre to cost $141 million over five years. The government said work to upgrade infrastructure and security at the facility would begin immediately, with the extra beds to come online in a staged approach from early next year. The reopening of the centre comes as Victoria experiences a surge in crime, with repeat youth offenders contributing to the increase in offences. Corrections Minister Enver Erdogan said the centre was needed once more to ease the strain on other youth justice facilities. "We have seen a significant increase in the amount of young people in custody in that time so we're making these changes to keep our community safe," he said. "It's an important decision [and] not taken lightly, but it's crucial to ensure people are taken to account and young people are given an opportunity to rehabilitate. The government said Malmsbury would house a "low-risk" cohort of young people aged 17 and over. The facility operated for nearly 60 years before being mothballed in late 2023. The youth justice centre was the site of riots, brutal bashings, and escape plots before the government announced its closure. Just months before it closed, seven staff members were held hostage during a riot at the centre which left two people in hospital. Some staff members had weapons held to their throats, including a sharpened broomstick, in what was described as like a "scene from a movie". After the closure of the Malmsbury facility in 2023, a number of the young offenders housed there were moved to the new Cherry Creek Youth Justice Centre at Little River. The corrections minister said he was not concerned about the potential for more violent incidents at the facility once it was reopened. "Since those incidents, we've had various changes to the workforce model but also the cohort that will be transferred to Malmsbury will be a lower-risk cohort, so I don't envisage that same level of risk as in the past," Mr Erdogan said. Shadow Corrections Minister David Southwick said the centre should never have been closed. "They said when they closed [that] it was outdated, it wasn't fit for purpose. Now all of a sudden, it's needed," he told ABC Radio Melbourne. "Who knows if we're going to have enough people to actually run the prison? Who knows how much it's going to cost?" Melissa Hardham, the CEO of community legal centre West Justice, said the government should be spending more money on intervention programs. "When we see the government reinvesting in further prisons or reopening a prison like Malmsbury, we're always going to be inclined to say that there's way too strong a focus on the stick and not enough on the carrot," she told ABC Radio Melbourne. "I think if that's our solution to this problem then it's not good policy. What we really need to do is look at what happens when someone goes to prison and what happens when someone is released from prison. "That is not the place to invest all the dollars in rehabilitation and reformation. What we really need to do is see it much earlier on in that person's experience."
