Figuring out the prison phone system was just one more thing Chris* had to do once he got locked up.
“The [prison] officers don’t really help you at all,” he says. “They don’t tell you nothing … You usually just ask one of the sweepers or someone like, ‘How do I use it? What do I do here?’”
But there’s a bigger problem than a lack of help and information, Chris says: the cost of phone calls made it very difficult to stay connected with his family.
“It was real depressing,” he says. “Mum didn’t have much money at the time. And the money that I had, I had to space out to make sure that I could call her at least twice a week.
“Even though I wanted to call her more than that, I didn’t have the funds.”
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Prison reform advocates argue the cost of calls in New South Wales correctional facilities is prohibitive and risks isolating men and women further, which can lead to more problems once they’re released.
The NSW Greens MP Sue Higginson is urging the Minns government to make phone calls free for inmates to help their rehabilitation.
Chris, who lives in Sydney’s south, says his mental health conditions made learning how to use the offender telephone system (OTS) stressful.
In NSW, each inmate is entitled to one free 10-minute call a week – but to a landline only.
In June 2023, three months after winning power, the NSW Labor government scrapped a service that provided low-cost calls for inmates to mobile phones. It dramatically increased the cost of a 10-minute call from 25c to $2.59.
The number of people with landlines has dwindled. In 2024, only 17% of Australian adults had a landline phone that they used for personal purposes, according to the Australian Communications and Media Authority.
The Sydney-based criminal psychologist Tim Watson-Munro describes prison phone calls as vital windows to the world for inmates.
The calls are an essential support structure connecting prisoners to family and friends, “particularly maintaining the relationships in anticipation of eventually getting out of jail,” he says.
“We found that the average survival rate of a relationship or marriage if someone was doing time was about two years.”
Watson-Munro recalls working in the now-closed Parramatta jail. “People were typically doing 10 years on average, so there was an inevitability that their marriages would fail and their worlds fall apart, and so what are they going to go out to when they are eventually released from custody?”
‘Heartbreaking decisions’
A spokesperson for Corrective Services NSW (CSNSW) says there are a number of ways inmates can contact family, including in-person, free audiovisual link visits or phone calls via the OTS or tablets.
For sentenced inmates, CSNSW covers the cost of one personal local call a week and all legal phone calls for those facing further charges. For inmates on remand, CSNSW pays for three personal local calls to landlines each week and all legal calls, the spokesperson says.
“To make additional calls, inmates can use personal funds, including allowances gained through voluntary employment.”
Inmates can also make calls using tablets, after a pilot initiative in 2020 designed to alleviate demand on telephones was installed in NSW prisons. Tablet calls have the same cost and restrictions as regular phone calls. There are now more than 12,000 tablets across the system.
The tablets have “significantly reduced” queueing for wall-mounted phones, the spokesperson said. As a result, call times for inmates have been extended from a maximum of six minutes a call to 10 minutes. The introduction of the tablets also extended the time during which inmates can make calls in most prisons.
Chris says the short calls were frustrating, especially as the six-minute limit when he served his sentence included an automated CSNSW message to alert the recipient it was a prison call, which cut into valuable speaking time with his mum.
NSW inmates receive a basic weekly payment of around $16 according to advocates, which they can use to buy food and hygiene products, and access movies and news on the provided tablets.
In September last year, Higginson tabled a petition in the state parliament, signed by 1,221 prisoners in NSW, requesting CSNSW provide all inmates with free calls to family.
Higginson says it’s essential inmates stay connected to improve their wellbeing and rehabilitation.
“It’s one of the simplest things in real terms the state can do when it has incarcerated somebody and deprived them of their liberty,” she says.
Higginson says listening to the lived experience and suffering of inmates’ families and loved ones motivated her to try to reform access to phone calls.
It is now up to the state corrections minister, Anoulack Chanthivong, and the commissioner of corrective services, Gary McCahon, to make this change, Higginson says.
A spokesperson for Chanthivong says the minister understands the importance of ensuring inmates maintain support networks on the outside without compromising the safety and security of the prison system.
“That’s why, following the minister’s instruction, CSNSW has successfully reduced call costs for inmates from the end of September 2025,” the spokesperson says.
“From [then] on, an inmate’s first call to a mobile number each week will be free, and there will be a reduction in the cost of subsequent mobile calls. The cost of calls to Australian landlines will also be significantly reduced, providing assistance to the many inmates who make calls to landline numbers.”
The CSNSW spokesperson says calls to any landline nationwide will cost the same as a local call, with a 10-minute call reduced from $1.80 to 25c. “This saving will be significant for inmates, as 30% of calls made by inmates are to landlines.”
According to the latest government data, the adult prison population in NSW has risen to 13,103 inmates – the highest number since 2020.
Dr Rory Gillard, from the Community Restorative Centre (CRC), says the advocacy group broadly supports free phone calls in NSW prisons.
“Contact with family while in prison can reduce the risk of people reoffending,” Gillard says. “The cost of phone calls in prison can sometimes force people to make heartbreaking decisions between buying basic essentials they need in prison and maintaining regular connections with their loved ones.”
The CRC is currently backing a petition called “Freedom on the line” that is urging parliament to make phone calls free and unlimited in NSW prisons. The petition was launched by Yung Prodigy, an organisation which focuses on young people affected by parental and kinship incarceration
Chris says that when inmates first enter prison they see a nurse and welfare office and can then make one welfare call.
“So I rang Mum when I got into custody and told her how to get a visitor identification number so she could put money into my account for me. And then it took me nearly 10 days to get all my numbers put on to the phone system before I was able to put $20 on the phone so I could ring Mum,” he says.
“The phone form sheet I had to put in wasn’t processed right away, and the time I had to wait to be able to speak to her was very depressing and stressful, and it was very sad. But what can you do?”
* First name only used for privacy reasons
