“Just close Ashley,”  the Tasmanian Prisoners Legal Service chairman said.

“It is simply an undergraduate school for Risdon Prison and should be closed and a humane, open-plan minimum security prison could be built on that site.”

Mr Barns’ comments come after Meander Valley Council announced it would lobby the state government to build a prison next to the detention centre at Deloraine.

He said a minimum security prison would give northern inmates the opportunity to be closer to their families, who would normally have to drive several hours for visitation at Risdon Prison Complex near Hobart.

The debate about a new jail follows a 2015 coronial inquest into three deaths in custody, including a Wynyard man who took his own life while being transported from the Launceston Reception Centre to Risdon.

Handing down his findings earlier this year, Coroner Simon Cooper said Mr Monson had expressed suicidal thoughts while in custody but was still transferred south.

Mr Cooper said the decision to transport him was “a poor one”.

The push to develop another prison also follows a report by the state’s Custodial Inspector Richard Connock in November, which described Risdon Prison Complex as being overcrowded and out-dated.

Corrections Minister Elise Archer acknowledged on Wednesday there had been “significant demand on our prison”. 

Ms Archer said the state government was “actively investigating” a northern facility, but the impact it would have on the Tasmanian Prison Service needed to be “taken into consideration”.

Premier Will Hodgman added the state government was “working through issues” and would make an announcement relating to a northern prison “in due course”.