Fury as prisoners learn to keep bees, play chess and sing behind bars – and you’re picking up the bill
JAIL inmates have had bee-keeping courses and been taught how to play chess behind bars, The Sun on Sunday can reveal.
Lags have also had taxpayer-funded singing lessons and “therapeutic art sessions” as part of their rehab in prison.
A probe of Ministry of Justice contracts shows how the vast prisons budget is being spent, with huge bills for courses and activities.
Almost £3,000 was spent setting up a bee-keeping course at HMP Leeds for ten inmates.
They took care of hives on the grounds, using protective suits to collect honey to be used in the prison kitchens.
The work was supported by the British Beekeepers Association.
Another deal saw charity Chess in Schools and Communities being paid £4,500 per year to teach the game to young offenders at HMP Isis in Greenwich, South London.
At Deerbolt Prison, Co Durham, a £91,000 project was awarded to a firm to provide a music programme to “encourage positive engagement and motivation through creativity”.
Beating Time — a group that organises in-prison choirs — was paid £36,000 for running singing groups at HMP Gartree, in Leicestershire, and HMP Swinfen Hall, in Staffordshire.
The contracts, revealed under Freedom of Information Act laws, show cash was also spent on in-cell kettles and workshop sewing machines.
David Spencer, research director at the Centre for Crime Prevention, said: “Law-abiding people, many of whom are victims of crime, do not pay their taxes to enable convicted criminals to learn to play chess, sing or express their creativity.”