"There are only three reformatories operational in South Africa -- two in the Western Cape and one in Mpumalanga," said Dr Sigamoneg Naicker, a director in the Department of Education.
Naicker was on Tuesday briefing members of the portfolio committee on education on the Child Justice Bill.
He said KwaZulu-Natal and the Eastern Cape, the two provinces which had the highest number of youths in prisons, did not have reformatories. In the Northern Cape and Limpopo they had neither reformatories nor schools of industry.
Distinguishing the two types of schools, Naicker said that schools of industry were "places of care for children with behavioural difficulties", while reformatories were places where sentenced youths were placed.
He said there were 16 schools of industry countrywide, on top of the three reformatories.
Naicker said that while the Department of Education supported the bill, it wanted to see certain things in place to make it work.
"There are not enough facilities and the director general of the education has sent a circular to all the heads of department to gather information about unused buildings, which could be used as youth care centres".
Other areas of concern for the department was security and educational programmes.
"We don't see learners as a homogeneous group, it is highly differentiated and each group has different needs," Naicker said about possible curricula.
The committee heard that there were currently about 1800 sentenced children in prison, 2300 awaiting trial, another 2000 in custody and about 400 in reformatories.
The Child Justice Bill, amongst other things, wants to replace reformatories with "residential facilities" and limit the age of the children at these facilities to 18 years of age, down from the current 21 years - Source : Sapa
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