178 new prison staff to stop a few mobile phones?

[HanleyS]

What's wrong with cellphone blockers? i.e. radio transmitters that clog the frequency as used by the Savoy cinema until they were told to cease. These would be far cheaper and more effective than employing 178 civil servants to search cells and find nothing.

http://www.ireland.com/newspaper/frontp ... 50503.html

Edit: I should have read the whole article before reacting. They are trialling the technology.

[bagel]

am i the only person out there thats wondering whats happening about the prison governor who allegedly allowed our most notorious prisoners to have top of the range tvs, computers, etc in their cells and allowed the sale of birdseed in the prison shop?
i am led to believe that the selfsame governor some years back half-assedly decommissioned his pc and donated it to the prisoners school, enabling the prisoners to access the personnel files of prison officers;
why are the authorities hinting that prison officers and prisoners' visitors are the only people who could be smuggling mobile phones into the prisons?
again, i am led to believe that on a daily basis the following have access to prisons and, in many cases, access to the prisoners themselves: healthcare workers (psychiatrists, psychologists, doctors, dentists, opticians, nurses, ambulance drivers, postgrad research students etc), assorted counsellors (eg AA,GA, etc), clergy (priests, ministers, nuns, rabbis, etc), educational personnel (teachers, artists, drama producers, horticulturists, stonemasons, yoga instructors, musicians, fitness instructors, etc), schoolchildren on guided tours, offenders under the youth liaison scheme, legal representatives (barristers, solicitors, legal secretaries, etc), gardai, visiting committee, military (perimeter sentries, liaison officers, arw, etc) construction workers, delivery drivers, it technicians, communications workers, drain cleaners, refuse collectors, pizza delivery fellas, and even the cable guy, to name but a few!
i am not casting aspersions but i am very impressed with the senior official who seemingly eliminated all the above from their enquiries!
it seems to me that a gross or so of extra prison officers will be powerless to stem the floodtide;

[L'Chaim]

More prison officers won't do any harm. The problem at the moment is that prison officers are spending more time out of the prisons than in them.They take God knows how many prisoners back and forward to court every day, they take HIV+ prisoners to hospitals and I believe that it takes at least three officers to accompany a prisoner to hospital. So it doesn't surprise me that all this carry on with phones, drugs etc. is going on in our prisons. There's hardly anyone there to police the jails. So extra prison officers is a good move, or a good start

[Stealth Assassin]

178 new prison staff to stop a few mobile phones?

And the odd murder or two.

[HanleyS]

The main reason appears to be to stop mobile phone smuggling, not weapons. Weapons can be improvised very easily, so smuggling is not necessary.

Hiring more prison officers costs money. If they are needed then the money should be spent, it seems like a knee jerk reaction to the recent discovery of widespread contraband. Like the bear patrol/tax in the episode of The Simpsons. 178 people cost a lot of money.