Why don't our prisoners work?

because slavery doesn't exist in Ireland...

Ah yeah but your accommodation is worth €8k a month!

A Battered Mars Bar wrote: »

Yes and 3 strike rule while we're at it. Be far better off for Irish society if people with 90 convictions are locked up for life after 3 and made to work so they can some use to us.

The three strike rule is a ridiculous law that has seen many low level criminals get absurd life sentences for minor crimes. We'd have to go down the privatisation route if that was enacted, as the prison population would be absolutely huge and would cripple the economy.

Bill Clinton has acknowledged that the three strike rule has been a disaster and a regret of his presidency

Can you imagine how many would disappear every time a group set foot outside the prison?

If prisoners were put to work doing "real" jobs, then private companies could complain (rightly) about unfair competition, and you would also have the above mentioned problem of "for profit" prisons, and all the potential problems that could bring. In order to get around both of these problems, you could make prisoners do "makework jobs" - such as digging trenches in the prison yard, which are then filled in and dug again, building brick walls using lime mortar which are then knocked down to be rebuilt, stripping car engines and rebuilding them etc.

Prisoners could be given very basic accommodation and food (no TV or playstation, no dessert, basic, no-frills cell) and they could earn these things through their work, and lose them if they refused to work or did their work badly.

The advantages to these types of jobs would be:

Prisoners would learn the discipline of real-world jobs - getting up at the same time every day, working a full 8 hours, taking orders etc.
They would learn real, usable skills - in the cases above, labouring, bricklaying, mechanical skills etc. which could be used when they are released
They would have less time on their hands, so less fighting, drug use, etc.
It would keep them fit and healthy, physically and mentally

A prisoner who did such work would have to be more prepared for life in the outside society than one who has sat in a cell, taking drugs and playing video games for the duration of their sentence.

The problem of course, is that the do-gooder brigade would consider it a human rights violation akin to the nazi concentration camps to make prisoners work, so it will never happen unfortunately. Far better to let them stew and plan their further criminal enterprises when they get out.

Imagine you own a small firm in the construction industry. Your local council needs some ditches dug and puts it out to tender. You put in a good estimate and feel confident the job is yours. Along comes Mountjoy Ditch Diggers Ltd. who come in at less than half of estimate due to their low to non-existent labour costs. And with their workforce of a few huindred they can do this again and again on multiple jobs

Stick the scobes in hard labour camps 14 hours a day, 7 days a week. Living conditions should be cramped, literally a pot to piss in. Think how

Reoffenders could increased to 18 hour days, one meal otherwise placed in solitary confinement for the entirety of their sentence.

Third time offenders hung in the streets.


Instead we have the UN telling us we are currently infringing on their human rights but putting them 3 to a cell.

If they wouldn't work on the outside they sure as shìte wouldn't work on the inside.

we could get the Japanese to run them

Gravelly wrote: »

If prisoners were put to work doing "real" jobs, then private companies could complain (rightly) about unfair competition, and you would also have the above mentioned problem of "for profit" prisons, and all the potential problems that could bring. In order to get around both of these problems, you could make prisoners do "makework jobs" - such as digging trenches in the prison yard, which are then filled in and dug again, building brick walls using lime mortar which are then knocked down to be rebuilt, stripping car engines and rebuilding them etc.

Prisoners could be given very basic accommodation and food (no TV or playstation, no dessert, basic, no-frills cell) and they could earn these things through their work, and lose them if they refused to work or did their work badly.

The advantages to these types of jobs would be:

Prisoners would learn the discipline of real-world jobs - getting up at the same time every day, working a full 8 hours, taking orders etc.
They would learn real, usable skills - in the cases above, labouring, bricklaying, mechanical skills etc. which could be used when they are released
They would have less time on their hands, so less fighting, drug use, etc.
It would keep them fit and healthy, physically and mentally

A prisoner who did such work would have to be more prepared for life in the outside society than one who has sat in a cell, taking drugs and playing video games for the duration of their sentence.

The problem of course, is that the do-gooder brigade would consider it a human rights violation akin to the nazi concentration camps to make prisoners work, so it will never happen unfortunately. Far better to let them stew and plan their further criminal enterprises when they get out.

the supposed "do-gooder brigade" (whoever they are) would not have an issue with this as long as
1. it was implemented properly and could be proved to work in cutting reofending rates and would mean prisoners would get work.
2. there was a guarantee that prisoners released from prison would receive employment.

soups05 wrote: »

3 strikes may not be a great rule, but 50 plus convictions and still walking the streets is a bad joke. why would any of us follow the rule of law when you can just rack up convictions like points in a video game with no consequences?
at what point should the courts say that's enough, you not getting back out.

i should imagine the reason most of us would follow the law is we don't want to end up in court or jail.

Summer wind wrote: »

Working would make a good change from them going to the gym and 3 course dinners with jugs of orange and coffee and watching tv all at our expense.

a lot of the living conditions claimed to be the case in irish prisons (and uk prisons) are over exaggerated on the basis of so called evidence by rags.

Conservative wrote: »

Stick the scobes in hard labour camps 14 hours a day, 7 days a week. Living conditions should be cramped, literally a pot to piss in. Think how

Reoffenders could increased to 18 hour days, one meal otherwise placed in solitary confinement for the entirety of their sentence.

Third time offenders hung in the streets.


Instead we have the UN telling us we are currently infringing on their human rights but putting them 3 to a cell.

well, the un are just going on the rules. if they are telling us we are in breach, then we are.

Prisoners could do jobs making things that the state would normally have to buy, but that wouldn't be economical to produce in Ireland (i.e. uniforms for the defence forces).

It would probably be good for the prisoners rehabilitation and mental health for them to have something to occupy their days with.

end of the road wrote: »

prison is not a holiday camp. i want my money spent on solutions proven to actually work in terms of cutting reofending rates, not to be pissed down the drain on solutions just to make some feel good. you guarantee employment for them on the outside as it will give them a foothold back into society and may even make them realise it's worth contributing to society then going against it. if it doesn't work and they reofend then you lock them up again. the facts are, the current ysystem doesn't cut reofending rates, the usual suggestions put forward here and on the internet in general are mostly rabel that don't work. so, one must put forward suggestions that haven't been tried here but have been tried elsewhere and been proven to work.

At present "your" money is being spent on providing Sky Sports and Playstations to recidivist criminals with absolutely no evidence that it does anything other than make them want to go back inside on numerous occasions for "a break".
When they don't feel like a break, "your" money is spent, in vast quantities, ensuring they get legal representation to stay out, regardless of their record.

The definition of madness is trying the same thing over and over, expecting a different result - forcing prisoners to work may not be the solution, but it sure beats doing nothing.