A Billion Better Things

Date: 2016 - 2018

A Billion Better Things was a campaign to stop the building of a 2000-3000 bed mega prison at Waikeria. This campaign highlighted the billion better things that could be done to reduce harm in our system and respond to increasing prison population.

For this campaign we:

• Held an event Prison: A moral and fiscal failure?

• Julia Whaipoti attended the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues as a member of the Māori Delegation and raised the kauapapa of building a mega-prison. 

• Katie Bruce attended the Rethinking Justice Conference in Ireland run by their Howard League. 

• Led a media campaign with various JustSpeak spokespeople to add pressure on the Labour Government to stop the build

The pressure worked and in 2018 Labour announced they would scale back Nationals initial plan for an 2000-3000 bed prison to add an additional 600 beds. 

You can learn more about our vision for a world with no prisons by watching the Ted Talk: A World Without Prisons by our previous Director Tania Sawicki Mead.