Former SA MP slams life behind bars after being locked up
A former MP locked up in prison for 10 days over assault charges has slammed a state government decision to keep the Adelaide Remand Centre privatised, saying it is “worse than Yatala”.
Former MP Nick McBride, who is currently under home detention after facing charges of assaulting his wife, has slammed the state government’s decision to renew its contract with Serco, the private operator of the Adelaide Remand Centre.
McBride – who campaigned in his former seat of MacKillop during the state election wearing an ankle monitoring bracelet – was a member of the Marshall Liberal government from 2018 to 2022, when the Adelaide Remand Centre was privatised.
However, he told InDaily that he had spoken to inmates after being held in the Mount Gambier Prison who said the Remand Centre was “worse than Yatala”.
“It basically just scares them to hell,” McBride, who is part of a family that owns one of the wealthiest pastoral and grazing companies in Australia, said the inmates had to share their cells with violent drug users.
“If you can imagine that volatility that anyone, whether you be a drug user yourself or you’re to be the most innocent, businesslike family man, that’s been caught up in some nonsense and you end up being held in the Remand Centre, that he’s going to be your cellmate,” he said.
“It’s really, really scary. No matter who you are, unless you’re up above everyone else, you can hold your own. You’re at the whim of the guards and the rest of the inmates to either work with you or it could be against you.”
McBride, who was held at Mount Gambier jail after his arrest over charges including breaching bail on December 27 last year, said it was “chockers” and “overflowing” when he was an inmate.
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“I was in an induction area and there were about eight or nine other inmates in six cells that were capable of 12,” he told InDaily.
“The last night I was there, there were 13 because there was a mattress on the floor in one cell that had disability-type handicap facilities, a bit more room, so they chuck another mattress in there – it tells you how full the system is.”
McBride, who resigned as chair of the board of A.J. and P.A. McBride pastoral company in February this year, said that while incarcerated at the Mount Gambier prison, his day was structured, with activities like soccer, football, gardening, metalwork and woodwork.
However, he said that these same activities were not available to inmates at the Adelaide Remand Centre, claiming that now the system was in private hands, it was a “money-making machine”.
Last Friday, the state government announced it would be renewing its contract with private operator Serco for a further five years, one day after a damning report was released, finding the privatisation had been a “failure” and listing incidents of violence, drugs and a high-profile escape attempt.
McBride was originally charged with three counts of assault in April 2025. In October 2025, he was charged with a further three counts of assault against his wife. In December, he was charged with aggravated assault and breaching bail.
The former MacKillop MP told InDaily he vigorously denied the allegations and hoped to “clear my name”.
McBride, who lost his seat at the 2026 state election, said he was currently navigating a divorce process from his wife Katherine McBride and keeping himself busy working on his uncle’s vineyard near Cape Jaffa.
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His former seat of MacKillop was won by One Nation MP Jason Virgo with 50.8 per cent of votes on a two-party preferred basis against Liberal candidate Rebekah Rosser, who achieved 49.2 per cent of votes. McBride, who had held the seat since March 2018, received 3398 votes at the March state election.
McBride thought people were “becoming very sick and tired of the major parties and the way that we are living our lives”.
Asked if he would ever re-enter politics, McBride ruled it out, saying: “I’m going to work very, very hard to clear my name”.
“I think if I hadn’t had the allegations against my name, the work that I’d done, I believe I would have been a shoo-in, and I have to say I’m just dreadfully disappointed at the result and I’ve just got to move on,” he said.
“In some people’s eyes, even if I clear my name, even if the allegations were not found to be as correct as they have been insinuated, there’ll be people out there thinking that I’ve done something anyway.”
A spokesperson for Correctional Services Minister Michael Brown declined to comment further on the renewed agreement with Serco. The Remand Centre is one of only two correctional facilities in the state operated by private companies. The other is the Mount Gambier Prison, operated by G4S Custodial Services.
Brown said on Friday, when announcing the contract renewal, that there were “a number of serious challenges in trying to reverse the Liberals’ privatisation of the Adelaide Remand Centre”.
“In 2019, the then Liberal Marshall Government entered into a seven-year contract with a five-year renewal period that is difficult to unwind without incurring significant cost to taxpayers,” he said.
“I take the management of the Adelaide Remand Centre extremely seriously and I will continue to work closely with the PSA, UWU and Serco to ensure safety within the prison.”
InDaily was unable to reach McBride’s wife for comment.
A Serco spokesperson said that since 2019, Serco “has delivered a secure, responsive remand solution at the ARC”.
“This five-year extension will see Serco continue to support the Department for Correctional Services’ strategic goals aimed at reducing reoffending and maintaining the integrity of South Australia’s correctional system,” she said.
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