Reading National's prisons policy [PDF], private prisons aren't the worst of it. They're also planning a massive expansion of prison slave labour, enforced by the threat of denying parole. So, under National, we will be running private, for profit slave camps, where prisoners are forced to work for the private profit of outside businesses. Easy, cheap labour, with no labour rights, no employment contract, no effective means of dispute resolution, no enforceable workplace safety standards, and no right to strike, kept in line with the threat of physical violence - just like America.
This is simply evil - there is no other word to describe slavery. It is also a toxic nexus ripe for abuse, which will undoubtedly come back to bite us. National will no doubt posture, and remove the right of any prisoner to enforce their rites through the courts (as they promised to do over earlier human rights abuses in prisons). But that simply means prisoners will have to seek justice by other means...
