The First Real Test For Ken Clarke’s Replacement…

…and that’s to tell these people to take a hike:

A scheme to temporarily release prisoners serving lengthy jail terms into communities should be extended to help more inmates, campaigners have said.

Prisoners need to be given more responsibility for their own sentence and rehabilitation to help tackle the problem of almost half of adult offenders being reconvicted within a year of their release, the Prison Reform Trust report said.

Perhaps a better way of tackling the problem would be to not release offenders who haven’t learned their lesson?

Still, I’m sure their report is based on impeccable evidence:

Based on visits to nine prisons and talks with groups of 40 prisoners and staff and 30 prisoner interviews, the report called for an extension of the ROTL system.

Oh. OK. Maybe not…

One woman serving a long sentence in an open prison told the researchers she wanted to do some work as a volunteer but, when she found a placement with a business, was told she could not accept it because it was not charitable. She then found a place in education and was told that, if it was training, the educational institution would have to pay travel expenses.

"I was already having to explain that I was a prisoner," she said. "It just seemed designed to make things harder."

Yes dear. That’s what being a convicted criminal should do. It’s just how it should work.

It’s designed to teach you (assuming your parents never instilled any basic morality) that being a criminal is an occupation fraught with unpleasant consequences.

A Ministry of Justice (MoJ) spokeswoman said: "A balance must be struck between helping prisoners to resettle successfully so that they do not reoffend and making sure a custodial sentence is just that - and properly serves its purpose of being punitive and maintains public confidence in criminal justice."

Wow! Maybe the new boss is having an immediate effect – nice to see an admission that prison is (or should be) a place of punishment…