How can we improve the country

[Proximus]

'cos they don't want to work for £6.10 an hour?

 

AMEN!

 

Also we could be targeting the things that we see that need sorting but no one remedies. I was in New-York for a while and during the night on certain streets they wash down their pavements and carry out cosmetic work. perhaps this could do the same and bring about a bit of civic pride. Dredging canals or rivers, walking the length of Britains railways and removing the millions of walkers packets, mars wrappers and shopping trolleys.

 

The plan isn't to take away jobs but to create work for people which wouldn't cost anything. If certain tasks were deemed financially beneficial to do they would be done, the fact that it would cost too much to do means they haven't. Put a price-tag on an initiative which would cost £0 then how much more attractive would it become?

[Proximus]

What do we do about the people who are already doing these jobs?

 

Well we don't go about it with a one for all attitude, we means test every opportunity for example: Farmer A has a field and seasonally he employs 50 foreign workers for £5 for every 10Kg they harvest. Next year Farmer A can do the same harvest and pay £0 per 10kg as he will be supported by the new "prison to work initiative" his tax money has always covered jails and now they are working for his benefit. The fact of the matter was that British workers never undertook the work in the first place as it wasn't financially effective for them and so the work was undertaken by a more mobile workforce who did their bit then sent their earnings home or lived off the small amount they made before moving on.

 

Should Farmer A be employing mainly British staff for this task then means testing would suggest that this project be unsuitable.

[Paddy]

I like this suggestion. Let's get them cleaning up run down areas etc.

[chocki]

Yes I am all for the chain gangs. I often watch for chain gang programmes from America on TV and often wonder "Why can't they do that here?"

[Number Six]

It would, if done correctly bring this country back to what we used to be, make them work for as little as possible, and then we could manufacture at little cost and export for a little less than the market value.

 

Why on earth would you want to sell something for less than it's value?

[Binster]

Yes I am all for the chain gangs. I often watch for chain gang programmes from America on TV and often wonder "Why can't they do that here?"

 

If America went back in time about 50 years in times and passed through the reality barrier into TV land, yes, you would still see chain gangs.

 

In reality, about 25-30 years ago the US government finally decided that they wouldn't bother trying to rehabilitate offenders because re-offending rates were so high. They spend $billions expanding prisons and extending sentences and basically just lock criminals up and keep them off the streets. And guess what, it's ACTUALLY WORKED! Crime rates in most US cities have fallen off in all except the most deprived neighbourhoods in the major cities. The US incarcerates a greated percentage of it's population that any other developed country.

 

It's basically what everyone in Britain wants but our 'justice' and 'human rights' legislation and case law prevents it because the system assumes people will behave themselves if we cut them enough slack.

[Rope_Access]

Isn't the use of criminals for cheap labour partly responsible for leading America into massive prison populations?

Private companies profiting from high prison numbers and overcrowding?

Corrupt individuals ensuring that prisons are crammed to maximum capacity?

 

I think it is a good idea to try and promote the work ethic, but it should be for community good and not to line investors pockets.

[Proximus]

If America went back in time about 50 years in times and passed through the reality barrier into TV land, yes, you would still see chain gangs.

 

In reality, about 25-30 years ago the US government finally decided that they wouldn't bother trying to rehabilitate offenders because re-offending rates were so high. They spend $billions expanding prisons and extending sentences and basically just lock criminals up and keep them off the streets. And guess what, it's ACTUALLY WORKED! Crime rates in most US cities have fallen off in all except the most deprived neighbourhoods in the major cities. The US incarcerates a greated percentage of it's population that any other developed country.

 

It's basically what everyone in Britain wants but our 'justice' and 'human rights' legislation and case law prevents it because the system assumes people will behave themselves if we cut them enough slack.

 

That's true but America has a faster growing population to us, naturally this would encourage a faster growing prison population also. They seem, in this instance, to have assumed that the population is growing and re-offending wasn't decreasing and so whatever it was that they were doing wasn't working and so ceased many projects. I watched something on TV not long back about a maverick Prison Warden who ran his prison with an iron fist, the inmates were bunked in tents outside (he was in Arizona so i'm not saying that this would work in our climate) and were forced to wear bright pink jump-suits. He had revolutionized the states approach to rehabilitation and re-offender rate, Decreased the contraband found within the prison and decreased violence within the prison. All it took was a little thinking outside the box

 

Isn't the use of criminals for cheap labour partly responsible for leading America into massive prison populations?

Private companies profiting from high prison numbers and overcrowding?

Corrupt individuals ensuring that prisons are crammed to maximum capacity?

 

I think it is a good idea to try and promote the work ethic, but it should be for community good and not to line investors pockets.

 

I think they looked at it from the wrong angle in terms of financial gain on the bottom line. We could look at it as 80,000+ inmates costing £?k per year how many man hours of work can we generate for the governments investment for each inmate. Also if we began with the mandate that we weren't going to be carrying out jobs that the free population could do, we would be doing the jobs which no one can/will do for what it's worth.

 

Publish all the information to the public so they can see the breadth of work being undertaken and keep the project above board i.e if it is a known factor that Sheffield Farms Ltd employed 100 Prisoners to do a total of 24,000 hours work last year whilst at the same time made 15 redundancies to staff on their books then their taking advantage of the system would be publicized and bring them into disrepute. Everyone would want to take advantage of the programme but would be so careful to work within the rules to protect their reputation

[Mel's Mum]

what you havent taken into consideration is that a large percentage (not all) of the prison population live on the boundaries of society and often have little or no social skills. This makes it hard for them to interact with large groups and nigh on impossible to negotiate team work. You suggest chaining them together but can you imagine the chaos if a disagreement broke out and they all started fighting? Or what would happen if the chained together collective turned on the guards and made a collective bid for freedom?

 

Your idea does have some merit in an ordinary everyday world where everyone abides by the same social contract but unfortunately not many of the prison population live by those sort of rules.

[L00b]

[reactionary L00b]

 

It would solve the prison overcrowding problem: prisoner hot-bunking, one shift works while the other sleeps. Hey presto, you can double prisonner numbers: longer sentences can be passed, and no new prisons need to be built.

 

[/reactionary L00b]