Welcome Message from Commissioner Ron Woodham
Commissioner Ron Woodham
The NSW Department of Corrective Services can reasonably claim to be the oldest government department in Australia.
As NSW was established in 1788 as a penal colony, the soldiers in charge of the convicts on those first vessels became the first gaolers in the settlement which is now Sydney - and so, after several name changes, the present Department of Corrective Services has a lengthy history in European Australia.
As a department with custodial facilities and Community Offender Services offices across the State, we acknowledge those earlier Aboriginal landowners on whose lands we now carry out the duties entrusted to us.
Most people think of Corrective Services as prisons - high walls, razor wire and blue and green uniforms.
In fact, we have twice as many clients in the community as in correctional facilities. Refer to the current information available from Research and Statistics.
You may be visiting this website as a student, engaged in research of one kind or another.
You may be a family member of a person serving a sentence within a facility or in the community. You may be seeking information about visiting inmates in a correctional centre.
Perhaps you are seeking to work with us. As a large government department, we offer many diverse career opportunities
Or you may just be curious to know about the NSW correctional system.
You are all welcome.
A great deal of information about the NSW Department of Corrective Services is now accessible through this website and I hope you find what you are looking for.
Ron Woodham
Commissioner