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"Moving from one location to another, without authority, even for a chat, is an offence punishable under discipline. How could staff get together to gamble?" he asked.
"These allegations have been made up by someone who has never been in a prison because the person clearly has no idea of how the system works," he added, noting that the person who had made the claims now states he was misquoted.
Mr Lai said gambling among prisoners was prevalent and that the department had disciplined 338 prisoners over the past six months for involvement in gambling or gambling-related activities.
"Of these, 23 were known to have been involved in running large gambling syndicates and in each case, severe action is taken against prisoners found involved with punishments that include solitary confinement, loss of privilege and loss of remission," he said.
The Commissioner also refuted suggestions that some staff had been indebted to the CSD Credit Union because of gambling.
"A degree of hysteria appears to have entered the discussions with someone claiming that 45 per cent of CSD Credit Union members were in debt. Of course they are. It is a Credit Union whose aim is to encourage thrift and self-help; if no-one owed it money it would cease to function -- the same goes for a bank," Mr Lai pointed out.
"This really has little to do with gambling. There are cases of people getting into very serious trouble with indebtedness, though more often than not it is bad investments, family problems and the like which cause the debt rather than gambling.
"We constantly monitor all staff in serious indebtedness. They are required to formulate a plan to repay the debts and will be held to it, and the potential for corruption is recognised and special steps are taken to guard against it."
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