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welcome to a home alone AA grumpy column..

no lady grumpy hasnt walked on on me after 20 years of marriage i wouldnt be that lucky shes gone to the bingo with my daughter so its just the two of us tonight.



The taxpayers' bill for ferrying prisoners around in taxis leapt by almost 10 per cent last year, it emerged tonight.

The Ministry of Justice admitted that in 2013-14 it spent £3.4million on taxis for inmates, up from £3.1million a year earlier, but insisted it was an 'economical mode of transport'.

The revelation is especially embarrassing after a Treasury minister last year said the bill was a 'scandal The bill for taxis for prisoners last year hit £3.4million, the highest since the first year of the coalition

Ministers insisted using taxis was an 'economical' way of transporting criminals, instead of buying dedicated prison vehicles.

According to figures released in response to a parliamentary question, the bill for taxis for prisoners came to £3,417,595, up from £3,133,614 last year

It is the highest the bill has been since the first year of the coalition. When last year's sum was revealed, Tory MP Priti Patel called it a 'scandal'.

She is now a minister at the Treasury, which has demanded a tighter grip on spending The figure is for the cost of transporting prisoners for public sector prisons in England and Wales.

Tonight Labour's shadow justice secretary Sadiq Khan said: 'Millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money is already paid to private companies to ferry around prisoners, and so the public will be confused why an additional £3million had to be shelled out last year for taxis for prisoners.

'Many people are struggling to pay their bills on a day to day basis, and taking a taxi for them is a rare luxury.

'They will look at offenders being shuttled around in taxis and question what has gone wrong with the world

'We need competent Ministers who know what they are doing rather than this shower This is yet more evidence of the shambles at the Ministry of Justice. David Cameron's government really do need to get a grip before any more of the hard pressed British public’s money is wasted.'

The Prisoner Escort Custody Service (PECS) is responsible for moving prisoners around the country, between prisons, police stations and courts and their care and security while in court custody.

It runs contracts for secure escorts for all inmates, apart from Category A prisoners But sometimes taxis are hired to drive them around instead of standard prison vans.

Prisons minister Andrew Selous said: 'There are occasions when the prison service may make use of taxis to provide prisons with a cost-effective, flexible way of fulfilling transport requirements for prisoners where there is a strong operational justification for doing so.

'This is an economical mode of transport (particularly in comparison with using cellular vehicles or purchasing cars). It reduces potential overhead costs for prisons, such as maintenance and cleaning, which have an impact on staff time.

'Prisons are able to access this form of transport at short notice, in response to urgent requirements.

Read more: Taxi bill for prisoners hits £3.4m but ministers insist it is 'economical' | Daily Mail Online

Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook

AAG

i am actually speechless your grumpy is for once totally gobsmacked

taxis for being used to ferry prisoners between prisons and police stations and the courts even catagory A long term sentence prisoners

which means you have burglars,rapists, drug dealers and murderers being moved by taxi from prison to court and back again which surely makes security of the escort a total farce.

add to that the escorting officers are most likely to be some young lad or a elderly gentleman nearing retirement age or even a working pensioner who are just glorified private security guards from serco or group 4 or some other security firm it doesnt take much effort to spring your mate from his 5 year sentence as no taxi driver or security guard is going to argue the toss when theres a sawn off purdy stuck up his right nostril or is being beaten senseless by a masked man wielding a baseball bat.

i always believed that justice was to protect the innocent and the idea of prisons were for punishment but it seems the tories intend to eventually hive everything off to the private sector from transport to the NHS and the prison service lining the pockets of their rich tory party donating friends.

who,s next in line for the contract warners , pontins , hoseasons, center parcs , or butlins ?

its true cameron and clegg are a unique double act ....... as

laurel & hardy

You could always take the opposite spin & say that the rise is actually a drop, "In Real Terms" (a favourite Politician's phrase), due to the number of convicts in prisons now being higher than ever before, having risen by about 20% so with the increase of taxi prices only being 10%, which is 10% lower than the 20% increase in prisoners, then "In Real Terms" it's a 10% saving.

I should put in for a job as a Political Spin Doctor.

You're not going to like this but, for one, anything has to be better than G4S who had a penchant for leaving prison van doors open and letting prisoners abscond.

In a purely economic sense, I can see that taxi's can save money. The problem with this outrage Is that most people associate taxi's as luxury travel but In fact they are used for many other services also. Hospitals use them to get blood quickly to another hospital for example but when people think of prisoners using them, It causes outrage.

It could be far more cost effective.

Keeping fleets of vans on the road Is costing not only In fuel but In maintenance, MOT's, Tax, oil etc etc etc. If you have a situation where only one prisoner needs escorting, you have wear and tear and millage on vans. When those Vans need replacing, then you are looking at thousands to replace them.

If the journey Is a relatively short one, hiring a taxi Is more cost effective because the taxi driver or the taxi company pays for MOT's, Tax and fuel.

Sorry but I think It's an Idea that balances It's books.

The BBC report gives a far more basic & realistic view on things, without all the typical Daily Fail hype.

BBC News - Prisoners taken to court in black cabs

Also, even according to the Mail's own (probably only loosely approximated) graph once again, despite the hype, although more than last year, overall, since 2008, the cost has been on the decline.

posted by aa grumpy

i always believed that justice was to protect the innocent and the idea of prisons were for punishment but it seems the tories intend to eventually hive everything off to the private sector from transport to the NHS and the prison service lining the pockets of their rich tory party donating friends.

who,s next in line for the contract warners , pontins , hoseasons, center parcs , or butlins ?

its true cameron and clegg are a unique double act ....... as

laurel & hardy


Good grief are you a closet socialist? Have you seen what ukip want to do, undo all the health and safety regulation, remove the dead hand of socialism from the nhs - on other words privatise it, let employers exploit workers to their hearts content and deprive them of the recourse they currently have to tribunals or with the human rights courts in the hague - fascism without the nice uniforms. Human rights and health and safety legislation gets in the way of business what kind of idiots falls for that one.

Morning Star :: Don’t be fooled – Ukip offers nothing for Britain’s workers

Oscar Namechange;1467044 wrote: You're not going to like this but, for one, anything has to be better than G4S who had a penchant for leaving prison van doors open and letting prisoners abscond.

In a purely economic sense, I can see that taxi's can save money. The problem with this outrage Is that most people associate taxi's as luxury travel but In fact they are used for many other services also. Hospitals use them to get blood quickly to another hospital for example but when people think of prisoners using them, It causes outrage.

It could be far more cost effective.

Keeping fleets of vans on the road Is costing not only In fuel but In maintenance, MOT's, Tax, oil etc etc etc. If you have a situation where only one prisoner needs escorting, you have wear and tear and millage on vans. When those Vans need replacing, then you are looking at thousands to replace them.

If the journey Is a relatively short one, hiring a taxi Is more cost effective because the taxi driver or the taxi company pays for MOT's, Tax and fuel.

Sorry but I think It's an Idea that balances It's books.


i see the sense in it oscar and to be honest i do like it yes it does make sense but the do the security implications outweigh cost just because this lets say a drug dealer has been sentenced to 5 years who,s to say he,ll get to jail to serve it

and how can you put a price on some innocent person being hurt or killed while doing their job or being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

unless they,re lucky enough to catch the cash cab and answer questions on their way to the nick,,,,

AA grumpy;1467075 wrote: i see the sense in it oscar and to be honest i do like it yes it does make sense but the do the security implications outweigh cost just because this lets say a drug dealer has been sentenced to 5 years who,s to say he,ll get to jail to serve it

and how can you put a price on some innocent person being hurt or killed while doing their job or being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

unless they,re lucky enough to catch the cash cab and answer questions on their way to the nick,,,,


Good points but I really don't think there Is much to fear.

The vans mean more than one prisoner can be transported at a time and It also means that It can present a situation where there could be just one warden or two wardens In the back of the van with say, 4 violent crims. That Is a far more dangerous situation because you could have just two officers with 4 violent crims kicking off In the van and even over-powering them as It has happened In the past with G8S.

In a taxi, If the crim was violent, two wardens can be In the back either side of them.

I'd rather have two wardens either side of one crim than just two wardens In the back of a van with 4 crims.

I doubt if taxis would be used when it comes to multiple prisoners - especially dangerous ones.

FourPart;1467088 wrote: I doubt if taxis would be used when it comes to multiple prisoners - especially dangerous ones.


I agree.