McDowell closes Spike and Curragh jails

capistrano

Spike Island and the Curragh will be closed but the other 2 will be taken out of the prison service - this is where privatisation is coming from.

I just think that most other folks on this discussion are completely resistant to change. Quoting examples of how privatisation hasn't worked in other countries.

Well, public sector prisons clearly doesn't work too well in Ireland. It costs a fortune, drugs are rife and any kind on management change is blocked by atavistic staff.

BuffyBot

I just think that most other folks on this discussion are completely resistant to change. Quoting examples of how privatisation hasn't worked in other countries.

I don't think anyone here is resistant to change. We've been resistant to people coming in with soundbite remarks and suggestions of privatisation (which whether you like it or not, has not been a success in other counties. It's hardly a huge leap to suggest it won't be much more successful here)

Well, public sector prisons clearly doesn't work too well in Ireland. It costs a fortune, drugs are rife and any kind on management change is blocked by atavistic staff.

I think you'll find that drugs are a consistant problem across the word in prisons. As for change - I don't think anyone has blocked any reasonable changes, introduced in a reasonable manner.

capistrano

We've been resistant to people coming in with soundbite remarks

Well, all I can say to that is you're all a bunch of lefto pinkies!

You think the prosion officers would accept a reasonable offer? A €12.5k lump sump and and extra €10k/per year to agree to up to 7 hours overtime per week sounds more than reasonable to me. But, guess what, they rejected it!

The kind of reasonable offer the prison officers want is one where we the irish taxpayers just bend over and let them have their way (metaphorically speaking).

Cork

Er, no. Try "possible guilt by direct close connection with a vested interest"

Could you list the TDS that have no direct close connection with a vested interest?

Are TDs surposed to live up mountains like hermits?

We live in a small country. Dublin is a small sized capital city. How is it possible not to have close connections with people?

The singling out of Liz O Donnell is absurd.

What was the political party a number of years ago that got all the bad publicity over nepotisim?

It was not FF. It was not the PDs.

Sparks

Originally posted by Cork
Any contracts to privatise the service would have to go out to tender?
Could you list the difficulties you have with the tendering process?

The first problem would be that the last few instances we've seen of the government holding a tender process have shown they are totally clueless with regard to running a tender process. Calculations as to what the tender should come to being made out on the back of an envelope? With my money? F**k that....

Where has a government decision been made to privatise the service?

That would be the nice treaty Cork. Remember, that one where we were invited to continue to vote until we gave the right answer? :rolleyes:

Cork

That would be the nice treaty Cork. Remember, that one where we were invited to continue to vote until we gave the right answer?

I was aganist that particuler treaty. But as the Irish voted for it I accept the result.

Privatisation is not on the Agenda. What is on the aganda is €64 in overtime payments.

You think the prosion officers would accept a reasonable offer? A €12.5k lump sump and and extra €10k/per year to agree to up to 7 hours overtime per week sounds more than reasonable to me. But, guess what, they rejected it!

In many industries - workers have simply to accept changes in work practices without any monetary reward. In my organisation - increased multi skilled is being introduced.

Any increased Payments? Nope.



Could somebody spell out what objections ye have to privatisation?

The privatisation of Eircom was supported by the unions - but the break up of CIE is not?

sceptre

Originally posted by Cork
Could you list the TDS that have no direct close connection with a vested interest?

Of course not. Equally I couldn't name the ones that do. TDs are required to declare all financial interests they personally have in companies. Mind you they're supposed to be telling the truth when they say their tax affairs are in order as well. That's to ensure an absence of conflicts of interests when legislating. For this reason I'd contend (along with quite a few other honest people I'd imagine) that such a declaration should also include /immediate/ family members (so knock off on the "connections" and extended family red herrings, there's a good little chap) in an attempt to eliminate or at least lessen possible conflicts of interest.

It wouldn't guarantee an absence of corruption. It would however lessen the likelihood of this happening. Immediate family members would include a spouse, children, parents and possibly siblings. This country has had a history of corruption, especially since the late 70s. It's time not just to get the dishonest people out of Irish politics but to make sure everyone can be reasonably sure that the dishonest people have been weeded out.

I could do a Joe McCarthy and pretend that I've a list of names. I don't need a list of names. Ideally people would put their names on the list themselves rather than face automatic disqualification from holding a political post. That's how company law has developed in the past few years - directors have a responsibility to shareholders and a responsibility to avoid dishonest and reckless trading. The penalty - disqualification from being a director for five years - is automatic. Why should we be any less stringent with our elected officials? (er, the correct answer is that we shouldn't)

BuffyBot

Privatisation is not on the Agenda. What is on the aganda is €64 in overtime payments.

Ermm...yes it is. McDowell want's to privatise two prisons.

Could somebody spell out what objections ye have to privatisation?

As I sad earlier, you only have look at how crap it has been elsewhere. Do you really think it will work any better in Ireland?

Cork

What objections had Irish Trade Unions when Eircom was privatised?????

Was Dick Spring (LABOUR) not a board member?

Privatisation is not a bad thing in itself.

If privatisation can lead to better management - they why not?

Sparks

What objections had Irish Trade Unions when Eircom was privatised?????

The only trade union that had any right to complain (the one which represents Eircom employees) had signifigant objections and there followed a long protracted set of negotiations, the end result of which was that eircom employees with tenure kept that tenure and kept ownership of the largest portion of Eircom's shares.

Was Dick Spring (LABOUR) not a board member?

Yes, he was - and that's perhaps the main reason he was not elected in the general election, and that's why none of his family are overly happy with him at the moment.

Privatisation is not a bad thing in itself.

No more than uranium is....

If privatisation can lead to better management - they why not?

If it could, why not indeed. But it never has. Ever. Look to the UK, look further afield. Privatisation doesn't work for what should be national services. That's been proven, time and again, both in this country with Eircom and abroad.

capistrano

Oh my god! Such closed attitudes. Privatisation is the universal evil.

As regards failing everywhere else. I don't accept that anyway. They had problems but the have big problems with public sector prisons too!

This issue here is purely down to finances. How do you an efficient prison service for a reasonable amount of money. The cost per prisoner in Ireland is amongf the highest in the world. In the USA the cost is as much much lower - sometimes just 10% of the Irish cost.

We can't just thow money at our problems. It's mine and every other taxpayers money and I don't want it squandered and is happenning now!

Redleslie

Originally posted by Cork

Could somebody spell out what objections ye have to privatisation?

The privatisation of Eircom was supported by the unions - but the break up of CIE is not?

Prisons are not like normal profit-making companies such as Eircom. They exist so that someday they won't have to exist if you see what I mean, whereas the aim of every private sector company is to expand. Privatised prisons can only make money if prisoner (service user) numbers grow, necessitating the building of more prisons. There's no incentive to rehabilitate prisoners or reduce recidivism, so it's bad for the prisoners and it's bad for society as a whole. People will go in bad and come out much worse. Apparently, Scotland's only private prison in Kilmarnock has the worst disciplinary record in the country, in 2001/02 twice as many offences were committed there than in Barlinnie prison, which has twice its population.

Originally posted by capistrano
Oh my god! Such closed attitudes. Privatisation is the universal evil.

Whereas you're arguing that it's infallible and ignoring all the evidence against it in the process, like a good little free market idealogue.

Redleslie

Originally posted by Sparks
If it could, why not indeed. But it never has. Ever. Look to the UK, look further afield. Privatisation doesn't work for what should be national services. That's been proven, time and again, both in this country with Eircom and abroad.

Well, Curitaba's transport system is semi-privatised and it works extremely well. But if anyone suggested trying anything they've done there in Dublin, they'd probably get laughed at or ignored.

gandalf

Originally posted by capistrano
Oh my god! Such closed attitudes. Privatisation is the universal evil.

Well thats a very sweeping statement isn't it. No one said that. They said the Privatising prisons is a bad idea and provided proof from other countries experiences to back it up. I agree with them, the prison service is an extension of the Security Services and should be manned by Public Servants. I think Redleslie has expressed why private prisons are illogical quite well. BTW I do support privatising the Bus Services

As regards failing everywhere else. I don't accept that anyway. They had problems but the have big problems with public sector prisons too!

Well they are prisons afterall :rolleyes: but what people have been proving here is that privatised prisons are not the manna from heavan that Fritz McDowell and his co-horts are making it out to be.

This issue here is purely down to finances. How do you an efficient prison service for a reasonable amount of money. The cost per prisoner in Ireland is amongf the highest in the world. In the USA the cost is as much much lower - sometimes just 10% of the Irish cost.

Well I suppose as the US lock up so many people that they have economy of scales working in their favour. Can you provide a link to this figures I would be very interested in reading them.

We can't just thow money at our problems. It's mine and every other taxpayers money and I don't want it squandered and is happenning now! [/B]

Oh I agree with you but I'm sure a prudent person like yourself would also conceed that this has to be planned out properly and not sorted in a kneejerk reaction or there could be some quite nasty consequences afterall prisoners are human beings and the aim of a prison is the rehabilitate them. That imho will be the first thing to go out the window if they do privatise them as they will be cutting costs to make the profit.

I dated a Prison Officer recently. Some of the chats we had were about her working day and it is appalling the conditions these people are expected to work under. I am not surprised that there is a high rate of "sickness". Its a high pressure job and they are not paid enough for it, most of them work overtime to allow themselves get a decent wage and they have to work 12 hour shifts at unsocial hours that most of us would not work.

The real problem with this is quite obvious to me and it is serious mismanagement from the Dept of Justice and the Government of the Prison Services. They should be insuring that the people that work at the coal face (PO's) should be given the support that they should have to do the job and that there are enough of them to do the job properly. Instead they are going for the quick fix and the Spun Headlines to look like they are doing their jobs.

Gandalf.

capistrano

Original post by gandalf
Well I suppose as the US lock up so many people that they have economy of scales working in their favour. Can you provide a link to this figures I would be very interested in reading them.

The Irish figures from: here

Cost of prison service €299m, average number of prisoners 3165: average cost per prisoner €94,470

You can get an average US federal figure of $26k from here

But state prisons are usually cheaper and I've see figures as low as $10k/year.

Cork

Originally posted by capistrano
The Irish figures from: here

Cost of prison service €299m, average number of prisoners 3165: average cost per prisoner €94,470

You can get an average US federal figure of $26k from here

But state prisons are usually cheaper and I've see figures as low as $10k/year.

Just some basic maths :€64m/Staff (at December 2002): 3,319

is: 19282.91

capistrano

I take it €64m is the overtime bill, so the €19k is the average overtime.

Cork

It is very rough maths exercise.

I would not say it was the average amount of over time per prison officer.

But over time costs within the service needs to be trimmed.

gandalf

Then you hire more prison officers and make sure management are utilising them properly which I can assure you from talking to the few I know they are not doing. Pushing the people who take all the stress into a corner is not the way to get the best out of them. Then again we are dealing with an arrogant bombast who really doesn't have a clue.

Where are the extra Gardai "Fritz".

Gandalf.

Redleslie

Originally posted by capistrano
The Irish figures from: here

Cost of prison service €299m, average number of prisoners 3165: average cost per prisoner €94,470

You can get an average US federal figure of $26k from here

But state prisons are usually cheaper and I've see figures as low as $10k/year.

The US has 2 million people in prison, about 0.7% of the population. We have around 3000, about 0.075% of the population. My maths aren't too good but I think overall, that means it still costs around 2 or 2.5 times as much to keep US prisoners locked up than it does here.

gandalf

Actually heres a much more interesting document for all the stat whores here of US prison expenditure. Unfortunately its only from 1996.

http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/spe96.pdf

(just as side note from the overall discussion!)

Gandalf.

capistrano

Then you hire more prison officers and make sure management are utilising them properly

When we already have more prison officers per prisoner than most places your solution is to hire more!!!

And you want management to utilise them properly. Well, that's exactly what they are trying to do but the IPOA won't agree to any reasonable change.

and Redleslie...

My maths aren't too good but I think overall, that means it still costs around 2 or 2.5 times as much to keep US prisoners locked up than it does here.

I agree, your maths aren't too good.

Redleslie

Originally posted by capistrano


I agree, your maths aren't too good.

Still better than yours though aren't they? Unless you can succeed in using some far out applied maths theories to prove that the amount each US taxpayer pays a year ($170-$185?) to keep the prison population locked up is actually less than what we pay (about €70?)

BuffyBot

Oh my god! Such closed attitudes. Privatisation is the universal evil.

ROFL - Pot, kettle, black?

Did anyone say all privatisation was evil? No.

We're talking about the privatisation of prison services, which does not seem the greatest of ideas.

Privatisation has it's place (transport, telecoms etc) but this isn't it.

Cork

At the end of the day – additional staff should be hired and/or work practices adapted to cut down on the massive overtime bill

capistrano

Originally posted by Redleslie
Still better than yours though aren't they? Unless you can succeed in using some far out applied maths theories to prove that the amount each US taxpayer pays a year ($170-$185?) to keep the prison population locked up is actually less than what we pay (about €70?)

You're comparing apples with oranges. The figures I gave are the cost of keeping one prionser for a year in Ireland and in the USA. You're figures seem to be the cost per taxpayer of supporting the entire prison service. And when you bear in mind that the USA imprisons a much higher proportion of theire population then the difference in the costs of the prison service seems very small.

Orinially posted by BuffyBot
ROFL - Pot, kettle, black?

What's ROFL? Probalby an insult.

gandalf

Originally posted by capistrano
You're comparing apples with oranges. The figures I gave are the cost of keeping one prionser for a year in Ireland and in the USA.

Well the so are you then. As I said earlier the US will have economies of scale with regard to their prisons which I believe are alot larger than the ones here.

Gandalf.

(btw ROFL = Roll Over the Floor Laughing, not really an insult)

capistrano

As I said earlier the US will have economies of scale with regard to their prisons which I believe are alot larger than the ones here.

That's true, so why don't we close all our prisons down and build and brand new one with a capacity for up to 4000 prisoners. This would be very modern with electronic gates etc. so that the need for acutal prison officers would be kept to a minimum.

That would be a very efficient way to run the prison service.

BTW thanks for the ROFL explanation.

gurramok

That's true, so why don't we close all our prisons down and build and brand new one with a capacity for up to 4000 prisoners

As long as its based in Ranelagh right beside McDowell where he can keep an eye on the prison officers, but then again that would be a vested interest for him

Cork

Originally posted by capistrano
That's true, so why don't we close all our prisons down and build and brand new one with a capacity for up to 4000 prisoners. This would be very modern with electronic gates etc. so that the need for acutal prison officers would be kept to a minimum.

That would be a very efficient way to run the prison service.

BTW thanks for the ROFL explanation.

Then why is state money being used to finace Victorian Type Prisons?

Would it not be better to build new prisons and finance this thru the sale of older prisons (many in prime locations)?

More efficent use could be made of Prison Officers - as they would be working in more modern facilities.