It was the call that proved that finally, the tide was turning on the misguided frenzy of privatisation that had blighted NSW for decades. Premier Chris Minns stood in Sydney’s northwestern suburbs and made the announcement the PSA CPSU NSW has been demanding for more than a decade: an admission that the Labor Party had made a mistake when it turned its back on a long-standing commitment to public services and privatised Parklea Correctional Centre.

Instead, the Premier said that from 2026, Parklea Correctional Centre was to once again be run by Corrective Services NSW (CSNSW).

“We need to be in a position where we are providing good rehabilitative services for people in NSW who fall foul of the law,” he said at the announcement. “And the public has to have the confidence that if someone is arrested and goes through the criminal justice system that they will be securely in confinement.

“We believe that the best way of doing that is providing public correctional services.”

The Premier said the decision to bring the prison back was due to a strong, long-running campaign by the PSA CPSU NSW.

“The PSA has been consistent on this matter,” he said. “They’ve argued for over a decade that the best way of ensuring the public gets value for money for corrective services, and we are focusing on rehabilitation and community safety, is to bring these services into public hands.”

Speaking beside Mr Minns at the announcement, PSA CPSU NSW General Secretary Stewart Little said public-run prisons were “an integral part of the criminal justice system” and “no different to the police or the courts”.

Mr Minns was not the only MP to praise the PSA for its role in reversing the privatisation of Parklea. Soon after the announcement, Labor Party upper house MP Mark Buttigieg stood up in State Parliament and praised “over a decade of advocacy from the Public Service Association of NSW”.

Speaking to the Legislative Council, Mr Buttigieg urged his fellow parliamentarians to “keep things in public hands when the government can do a better job and let the market look after things that are generally subject to competition”.

Delegate at Parklea, Corey Lyons, said he and his colleagues had worked hard to bring the prison into the state fold, praising the tight-knit camaraderie that has characterised workers at Parklea. He said he is confident this tight bond will continue as the prison becomes part of the larger government-run network of gaols.

Parklea Prison staff are not the only custodial staff celebrating being unshackled from profit-driven, cut-priced incarceration duties. The decision to renationalise the prison followed a similar decision in 2024 to bring Junee Correctional Centre, a prison run by the private sector since its opening in 1993, into the public fold.

On 1 April 2025, staff at Junee became part of the proud NSW Public Sector, a body of workers that has operated since the colonial era.

Even before the handover, staff at Junee had been introduced to the PSA.

“The majority of Junee Correctional Officers had already joined the POVB, and the sub-branch elected 12 POVB delegates at their first POVB meeting, which was held off-site at the Junee Ex-Services Club on 13 March,” said Prison Officers Vocational Branch (POVB) Chairperson Keith Smith.

At the meeting, Mr Smith addressed members, welcoming everyone to the “POVB family”.

“I am so proud to see so many Correctional Officers turn up after work tonight to join the PSA and elect 12 POVB Delegates and form a strong sub-branch,” he said. “We want you to improve safe staffing levels, get paid better wages, enjoy better working conditions and join a strong union that fully supports you as Correctional Officers.”

For the people providing vital services such as correctives, the end of privatisation can’t come soon enough. Parklea often was understaffed, meaning it had the state prison system’s worst record when it came to assaults in gaol. Workers were, in essence, being bashed for a better bottom line.

“Under the control of CSNSW, Officers in Junee, and in Parklea next year, are more likely to work in an environment that is fully staffed,” said Mr Smith. “This substantially reduces the chance of being assaulted at work.

“Every Officer should go home from their shift safely.”

The trend towards privatisation has also been reversed in another area of the Public Sector: child protection.

Long neglected by successive conservative premiers, the NSW child protection system relied on outsourced organisations to cope with widespread staffing issues created by poor wages and overwork. Agencies filling these gaps charged extortionate amounts for their services, often while handing the work to poorly paid, untrained agency staff.

“Again, the previous situation boiled down to one issue: should organisations make money from others’ misfortunes,” said PSA Assistant General Secretary Troy Wright.

Instead, the NSW Government needed to ensure there were enough well-trained, properly paid Public Service professionals, with a passion for helping children in need, were on the ground.”

Family Services Minister Kate Washington has committed to upgrade the positions for Child Protection Workers and improve pay. The Department of Communities and Justice will also be hiring more employees. However, Mr Wright said fixing the system after years of neglect will take some time.

In addition to privatisation and sell-offs, the previous Liberal National Party Coalition governed via an excessive overuse of consultants, adding extra strain on the Treasury and reducing accountability.

“Luckily the Minns Government has taken action,” said Mr Little. “Minister for Government Procurement Courtney Houssos launched an internal expert service from the ranks of the Public Sector.

“The Government’s Expert Advisory Network is run by the Premier’s Department and will provide projects across government with specialist advice and project support. Once done by consultants, these roles will include policy and strategy, stakeholder engagement, financial and commercial services, actuarial services, infrastructure, technology, and environmental services.

“It operates in a manner the PSA has been advocating for years: using a well-resourced, independent Public Sector with decision-making powers.

“These are services consultants do not do as well, and they usually cost a lot more. The work is better done by PSA members working for the NSW Government.

The fight against sell-offs is also in the hospital system. In March 2025, the Minns Government said the public-private partnerships (PPPs) so popular with the previous Liberal National Coalition governments were to end in the area of acute healthcare provision. This decision, labelled Joe’s Law, came about after a child, Joe Massa, suffered a cardiac arrest and died in September 2024 after waiting three hours in an emergency department operated by private hospital provider Healthscope.

The move was another welcomed by the PSA, which has coverage of some areas of NSW Health.

“Prisons, Child Protection and hospital emergency facilities are not playthings for the marketplace,” said Mr Little. “We appreciate the State Government’s efforts at bringing back to the public fold what are rightfully possessions of the state.”

Mr Minns won power in 2023 after listening to anti-privatisation campaigns run by organisations such as the PSA.

“These campaigns hit a nerve with the voters of NSW who were sick of seeing their public assets sold and their bills skyrocket as a result,” said Mr Little. “They drive on the world’s most comprehensive toll-road system, pay through the nose for land title services and have seen their TAFE colleges run down in favour of profit-driven private alternatives.

“The previous State Government was blinded by its obsession with privatisation. But the Labor Party, despite the sell-offs that lurked in its political past, listened to us, listened to voters and made a promise to end privatisation.

“With Parklea, Junee, Child Protection and acute hospital services, it has kept its promises to the voters who chose it over the Coalition.

“Indeed, the Coalition’s devotion to privatisation has been found to be poor economic management.

“Figures revealed by state government agency Value NSW have shown that outsourcing is too often the costliest option for the delivery of public services and the work is better done by permanent, full-time public servants.”

The body, part of the Valuer-General, is the key state agency that determines the worth of land for rates and taxes.

Fittingly for its name, the agency looked at the value provided by agencies and contractors it used for its highly specialised services and found that it was more cost-effective to hire permanent, full-time public sector workers.

Value NSW estimates moves to hire more internal staff will save the agency $28 million, and is therefore setting up a graduate program to attract high-quality public servants to its ranks.

“What Value NSW found is what we have been saying for years: outsourcing and privatisation are expensive ways to provide public services,” said Mr Little. “Value NSW crunched the numbers on how much money will be saved by hiring full-time public servants instead of using outsourcers and contractors.

“As we said in a recent campaign, privatisation hurts everyone. Everyone, that is, other than the outsourcing companies charging taxpayers top dollar.”

Value NSW also found that internal staff were also completing work faster than external providers and with a superior compliance rate.

“The costings done by Value NSW back up our campaign years ago against the privatisation of Land and Property Information, the State Government’s Land Titles function, was the wrong move,” said Mr Little. “We have buyers paying more for this vital service, when the right decision back then was to invest more in public servants.

“I urge all government agencies to follow the example set by Value NSW and look at the amount of money leaking from agencies to unaccountable outsourcing companies.”

“The failure of Peter Dutton to become Prime Minister after a campaign demonising Public Sector works shows the people of Australia are on our side. Voters understand the benefit of public service. ”

While he welcome moves to reduce privatisation, Mr Little said there is more to be done.

“We need to ensure outsourcing is removed from our corrective system,” said Mr Little. “We have an outsourcing agency with offices in our gaols responsible for upkeep that can be done for a better price by Public Sector workers. Even better, they can be assisted by inmates learning skills to aid their rehabilitation.

“We have also seen an obscene amount spent on consultants looking into the vast amount of money motorists pay to use Sydney’s massive number of toll roads.
“So, bizarrely, we have outsourcing looking into outsourcing.

“This work should be done by Public Sector workers.”

Mr Little, who worked as a Disability Support Worker before his election as General Secretary, said it is vital that a state-run service is restored to care for people with disability.

“We have members assaulted every day while working for profit-run organisations that are looking for ways to boost their bottom lines,” he said. “Like emergency wards, like prisons, our disability support services should be in public hands.

“The idea that someone’s disability is a gateway for another person’s profit is obscene.”

The NSW disability support system was completely privatised in 2017, against the wishes of the PSA. Until then, there was always a government safety net available, particularly for people with complex needs.

The PSA has also been alerted to the possible outsourcing of the process of printing drivers’ licences to overseas companies.

“Not only will this be an expensive exercise, it will also have major security and privacy implications,” said Mr Little.

“The fact is public services matter. An independent, well-resourced Public Sector is the best way to provide vital services such as licences.

“Likewise with TAFE. For too long, we have had conservative voices attempt to downplay TAFE in favour of cheap, private providers.”

With the Coalition in power in Canberra and Macquarie Street for much of the past decade, TAFE funding was cut. In NSW, a large number of regional campuses were closed, with students diverted to learning centres with more focus on online teaching rather than the hands-on instruction that had made TAFE a success story.

“The Coalition planned to cut fee-free TAFE courses introduced by the Federal Government,” said Mr Little.

The recent defeat of Peter Dutton proves that Australians value TAFE and the opportunity it provides for young people.”

It also proposed to make trainee teachers, nurses and social workers repay their ‘prac payments’’ of $315 per week during mandatory on-the-job training.

The payments were introduced by the Albanese government to help university students struggling with the high cost of living when they are required to work for free in schools and hospitals as part of their degree.

“The attacks on TAFE by a major party shows that we must never take for granted its role in our community,” said Mr Little.

“Whether it is TAFE, our universities or our Public Sector, we must always be vigilant. Not only for our members, but for the people who depend on the great work they do.”