Time to let prisoners earn their keep?

SO the Government is considering making some dole recipients work.

Why stop there? We have an ever-growing prison population and we are running out of space for them. Let’s get our able-bodied criminals out to work and instead of us forking out to put them up in swanky cells let’s get them to pay back society by doing physical labour in quarries and the like.

There are many infrastructure projects in my native west of Irelland that our criminals could begin the hard graft on. One-hundred prisoners could take the place of one digger, thereby helping to cut our carbon emissions. And they could be self-sufficient by fencing them into an enclosure and let them grow their own food. We could even give them some animals to rear. Surely the Greens would love this idea? Much better than hitting law-abiding commercial vehicle-users, don’t you think?