€145k taxpayers' bill for prisoners to watch Sky Sports

Mr.McLovin

http://www.independent.ie/irish-news/145k-taxpayers-bill-for-prisoners-to-watch-sky-sports-30754201.html

its a hard knock life...

New figures provided by the Department of Justice show the Irish Prison Service paid €76,601 last year to multi-channel providers to provide Sky Sports and other channels for inmates.

Money well spent

"Prisoners do not have Sky Sports in their cells, they have access to basic free-to-air channels."

God help them!

"PS1 and PS2 consoles are allowed. No PS3 or PS4 are allowed as these can be enabled for internet access.

bit harsh?

Generic Dreadhead

Eww.... PS2, poor lads, those games do not date well, and not a SNES in sight

TwoShedsJackson

Just think, we could have paid a TD for a year with that money :mad:

SEPT 23 1989

Do they have a little graphic of a pair of handcuffs instead of a pint glass at the bottom of the screen?

Turtwig

145k is pittance really. Making a mountain out of a molehill. Much we as we like to believe otherwise most people in prison are humans.

Timberrrrrrrr

Turtwig wrote: »

145k is pittance really. Making a mountain out of a molehill. Much we as we like to believe otherwise most people in prison are humans.

True


They are also their to be punished for their crimes.


Edit: I suppose having to watch h bog 1, 2, 3 & 4 is punishment enough

0byme75341jo28

Sky are ripping them off..

FutureGuy

These scum can play Grand Theft Auto 3?

Disgraceful, I can only buy the first GTA for my younguns.

I'm sure the prison staff get the benefit of watching these channels during their lunch or whatever too? Whole thing is a non issue if that's the case, and I would imagine it is.

Nodin

Timberrrrrrrr wrote: »

True


They are also their to be punished for their crimes.


Edit: I suppose having to watch h bog 1, 2, 3 & 4 is punishment enough

I'd say "the mask slips" but it actually fell off a while back.

whatawaster

Turtwig wrote: »

145k is pittance really. Making a mountain out of a molehill. Much we as we like to believe otherwise most people in prison are humans.

Humans do not need sky sports to thrive or even survive. We ought to use their time imprisoned to rehabilitate and educate. Any resources available should be targeted in those areas.

Karl Stein

I'm sure all those distractions help make the management of potentially troublesome prisoners a lot easier.

I mean, who in their right mind would want to stay in all day watching TV/Sports and playing consoles?

Wait a second....

whatawaster

Sacramento wrote: »

I'm sure the prison staff get the benefit of watching these channels during their lunch or whatever too? Whole thing is a non issue if that's the case, and I would imagine it is.

Public entities paying for pay-tv for their staff to enjoy on lunch would definitely come under waste of public funds.

What happened to a book, a newspaper, some conversation, a nice walk outside. Do workers need to catch up with Home and Away on their breaks?

efb

The gardai had sky sports in the barracks in Dundrum the day I volunteered for a line up.

Scobe looked nothing like me! He was scrawny

Nodin

whatawaster wrote: »

Humans do not need sky sports to thrive or even survive. We ought to use their time imprisoned to rehabilitate and educate. Any resources available should be targeted in those areas.

That would cost far more, and there seems zero appetite among the powers that be to go down that route.

VinLieger

So they are allowed to sit on their arses all day and watch tv and play games?

Put them to work digging ditches then fill in the ditches and make them dig them again.

Timberrrrrrrr

Nodin wrote: »

I'd say "the mask slips" but it actually fell off a while back.

Ah would you cop on, they have been called bog one and two since the 80's and 3 & 4 got added on when they started.

Fuhrer

Timberrrrrrrr wrote: »

Ah would you cop on, they have been called bog one and two since the 80's and 3 & 4 got added on when they started.

Ive never heard that before, what are they?

Turtyturd

Someone in the IPS Head office should ring up threatening to cancel the service and see if they can get 6months free....wonder if the paper would print that story.

efb

I'm sure it helps keeping the lags quiet

Menas

€145k per year on Sky subsciptions comes in at €32 per prisoner per year. Minuscule when compared to the total cost of €65,000 per year to keep em locked up.

whatawaster

Trigger Happy wrote: »

€145k per year on Sky subsciptions comes in at €32 per prisoner per year. Minuscule when compared to the total cost of €65,000 per year to keep em locked up.

Like so many of these things, it's the principle

Vincent Vega

FutureGuy wrote: »

These scum can play Grand Theft Auto 3?

Disgraceful, I can only buy the first GTA for my younguns.

And here I was lamenting the fact that I've just been left behind by the PS4/Xbone crowd.
These poor bastards have to make do with everything the other side of San Andreas

efb

whatawaster wrote: »

Like so many of these things, it's the principle

What principle?

kjl

They obviously aren't taking advantage of sky multiroom

efb

kjl wrote: »

They obviously aren't taking advantage of sky multiroom

Imagine the craic if they only had the magic eye, warden sticks on All Creatures Great and Small on ITV3...

Karl Stein

Trigger Happy wrote: »

€145k per year on Sky subsciptions comes in at €32 per prisoner per year.

And the €145K was over two years so probably less (unless you've used two years in your calculation)

kjl

Karl Stein wrote: »

And the €145K was over two years so probably less (unless you've used two years in your calculation)

it's about 1.3c a year per person in ireland

whatawaster

efb wrote: »

What principle?

Why are public funds being used to provide pay-tv to convicted criminals? There are plenty of free-to-air channels, so it is completely unnecessary. It doesn't matter what it costs, as there are sure to be better uses 145K (or any amount of money) could be put to in the prison services.

Menas

Karl Stein wrote: »

And the €145K was over two years so probably less (unless you've used two years in your calculation)

Ah, my point is thus doubled! €16 per prisoner per year.

They probably spend more on ketchup per prisoner per year.

efb

whatawaster wrote: »

Why are public funds being used to provide pay-tv to convicted criminals? There are plenty of free-to-air channels, so it is completely unnecessary. It doesn't matter what it costs, as there are sure to be better uses 145K (or any amount of money) could be put to in the prison services.

Maybe it helps keep the peace

topper75

- I as a law-abiding taxpayer deem a Sky Sports channel subscription to be a luxury beyond what I can afford.
- I then have money forcefully taken from me by the state in taxes.
- The state uses this money to ensure those who have been judged to be criminals (and have therefore forfeited the right to liberty) get to enjoy this luxury.

I must be missing a bullet point in the story.

Help me out here people!

whatawaster

efb wrote: »

Maybe it helps keep the peace

We pay prison guards to do that. We don't have open-plan prison living for that reason. Sky tv is completely unnecessary.

UnknownSpecies

topper75 wrote: »

- I as a law-abiding taxpayer deem a Sky Sports channel subscription to be a luxury beyond what I can afford.
- I then have money forcefully taken from me by the state in taxes.
- The state uses this money to ensure those who have been judged to be criminals (and have therefore forfeited the right to liberty) get to enjoy this luxury.

I must be missing a bullet point in the story.

Help me out here people!

Like someone pointed out, it's only €16 per prisoner for the year. It seems like a luxury but I think the real punishment is having no freedom and being kept from friends/family. Even animals in a zoo will get agitated without stimulation. Let them have their Sky.

Valetta

topper75 wrote: »

- I as a law-abiding taxpayer deem a Sky Sports channel subscription to be a luxury beyond what I can afford.
- I then have money forcefully taken from me by the state in taxes.
- The state uses this money to ensure those who have been judged to be criminals (and have therefore forfeited the right to liberty) get to enjoy this luxury.

I must be missing a bullet point in the story.

Help me out here people!

What price do you put on your liberty?

VinLieger

dorgasm wrote: »

Like someone pointed out, it's only €16 per prisoner for the year. It seems like a luxury but I think the real punishment is having no freedom and being kept from friends/family. Even animals in a zoo will get agitated without stimulation. Let them have their Sky.

Nope they are prisoners and should have zero luxuries beyond a bed and a toilet. Which reminds me how many prisoners are still slopping out? Maybe instead of buying them shiny consoles and tv subscriptions they could look into fixing that problem?

Karl Stein

whatawaster wrote: »

Why are public funds being used to provide pay-tv to convicted criminals?

Keep 'em quiet I reckon.

When you watch TV, brain activity switches from the left to the right hemisphere. In fact, experiments conducted by researcher Herbert Krugman showed that while viewers are watching television, the right hemisphere is twice as active as the left, a neurological anomaly. The crossover from left to right releases a surge of the body’s natural opiates

Krugman, Herbert E. “Brain wave Measures of Media Involvement,” Journal of Advertising Research 11.1

whatawaster

Karl Stein wrote: »

Keep 'em quiet I reckon.

Again . . . tv can be free. RTE, BBC, ITV, Channel 4, More 4, E4, Film 4, TV3, TG4, Sky News and COUNTLESS other channels.

There is no need whatsoever to pay a subscription. It's nonsense.

BMJD

They probably threaten to put on Fair City if anyone acts the bollox.

And that is inhumane.

Idbatterim

you would question if they made it a place to go where you would be bored out of your mind, would A) time drag a lot more it would be a place that they would be less likely to want to go back to C) if prison was tougher, sentences could be reduced, to get repeat offenders off the street (less time, but a way worse place to spend time)... obviously you could only do this with certain crimes...

Gbear

If it could be shown to reduce recidivism would you support it?

Too often I see people looking at this issue as cut and dry - "they're bad so they shouldn't have nice things". Before you decide that you have to decide what you want out of your prison system.

If it's just to vindictively punish people then it really isn't much use. Just revenge for the sake of it. Murdering a murderer is still murder.

If it's about making society better then that's a practical problem that needs to be addressed with empirical arguments. Some of those might be counter-intuitive and seem to be rewarding bad behaviour.

It's a legitimate concern about the government taking tax revenue from you, under pain of imprisonment, and using it to support these people in such a way - while you might be happy to give the money over to turn a petty thief into a teacher, a taxi driver or a doctor, you might be less inclined to support a serial murderer's interest in rugby.

But at the same time, if you want prison to be hell then you can't complain when there's broken lunatics streaming out of it after their sentences are finished.

Privatisation is one solution to try and get the best of both worlds but it seems to be an absolute mess in the US and has spawned an industry out of locking people away for profit. There shouldn't be an incentive for a person to be convicted of a crime.

Perhaps a non-profit private prison would avoid taxpayers paying for giving luxuries to those who don't deserve it but give people a chance to directly support those trying to better themselves?

efb

whatawaster wrote: »

We pay prison guards to do that. We don't have open-plan prison living for that reason. Sky tv is completely unnecessary.

Maybe they'd need more without Sky Sports so it may save money

Karl Stein

whatawaster wrote: »

There is no need whatsoever to pay a subscription.

There is if you want to see sports. I'd imagine viewing sports produces even more of an 'opiate effect' on prisoners.

topper75

Valetta wrote: »

What price do you put on your liberty?

€38.49

What point are you trying to make in this thread?

Maximus Alexander

Timberrrrrrrr wrote: »

True


They are also their to be punished for their crimes.


Edit: I suppose having to watch h bog 1, 2, 3 & 4 is punishment enough

That probably goes some way towards explaining why we have so many re-offenders then.

efb

topper75 wrote: »

- I as a law-abiding taxpayer deem a Sky Sports channel subscription to be a luxury beyond what I can afford.
- I then have money forcefully taken from me by the state in taxes.
- The state uses this money to ensure those who have been judged to be criminals (and have therefore forfeited the right to liberty) get to enjoy this luxury.

I must be missing a bullet point in the story.

Help me out here people!

You can go somewhere and watch IT if you wish, they are incarcerated

AlanS181824

Are we forgetting that these are people we're talking about here?

The idea of prison is to rehabilitate someone back into society granted that isn't always possible but still.

Do they not deserve "some" luxuries?

I'd say they'd crack up otherwise.

topper75

Gbear wrote: »

If it could be shown to reduce recidivism would you support it?

Too often I see people looking at this issue as cut and dry - "they're bad so they shouldn't have nice things". Before you decide that you have to decide what you want out of your prison system.

If it's just to vindictively punish people then it really isn't much use. Just revenge for the sake of it. Murdering a murderer is still murder.

If it's about making society better then that's a practical problem that needs to be addressed with empirical arguments. Some of those might be counter-intuitive and seem to be rewarding bad behaviour.

It's a legitimate concern about the government taking tax revenue from you, under pain of imprisonment, and using it to support these people in such a way - while you might be happy to give the money over to turn a petty thief into a teacher, a taxi driver or a doctor, you might be less inclined to support a serial murderer's interest in rugby.

But at the same time, if you want prison to be hell then you can't complain when there's broken lunatics streaming out of it after their sentences are finished.

Privatisation is one solution to try and get the best of both worlds but it seems to be an absolute mess in the US and has spawned an industry out of locking people away for profit. There shouldn't be an incentive for a person to be convicted of a crime.

Perhaps a non-profit private prison would avoid taxpayers paying for giving luxuries to those who don't deserve it but give people a chance to directly support those trying to better themselves?

Black is black.

White is white.

Criminals are criminals.

Punishment is punishment.

I really don't see what is wrong with the good old-fashioned "If I **** up I could go to jail" mentality. "If I **** up I could go back inside where they have Sky Sports" doesn't really cut it.

BTW - How in God's name are you shoe-horning some college-kid liberal's death penalty agenda into a thread like this? IRRELEVANT!

whatawaster

Karl Stein wrote: »

There is if you want to see sports. I'd imagine viewing sports produces even more of an 'opiate effect' on prisoners.

They show sport on FTA tv.

Irish channels have soccer, gaa, rugby, racing . . .
English channels have much of the same and more

You're really stretching here. There is no justification for this.

It's like this - we probably both agree that prisoners should have access to books. However, if it was found that we were purchasing brand new hardbacks for them, I'd consider it stupid and a waste.

They can get the same benefit from free tv that they would from sky. Nobody in prison needs to watch the ryder cup or premier league football.

Menas

AlanS181824 wrote: »

Are we forgetting that these are people we're talking about here?

The idea of prison is to rehabilitate someone back into society granted that isn't always possible but still.

Do they not deserve "some" luxuries?

I'd say they'd crack up otherwise.

We seem to have a mix of views on what prisons should be.
Some want a Long Kesh style facility with prisoners in chain gangs breaking rocks and eating gruel and stale bread.
Others want a mix of punishment and rehabilitation as well as protecting the public from those who are a danger.

Valetta

topper75 wrote: »

€38.49

What point are you trying to make in this thread?

The fact that you deem it a luxury is irrelevant.

Should prisoners be allowed stuff only up to and including what you can afford?

Your trivial answer to my question shows that you don't really understand the concept of prison.