The leader of Ontario Progressive Conservatives said Thursday that if elected premier in the fall, he would introduce work gangs for inmates in provincial jails.
"We’re not asking convicted prisoners to do anything more than what hard-working Ontario families do every day: work," Tim Hudak said. "Prisoners, through their own actions, have taken enough from society. It’s time they give something back."
Hudak said inmates would perform manual labour, such as raking leaves or cleaning graffiti, for up to 40 hours a week.
"I’m not sure digging ditches is a good employment opportunity," said Greg Rogers, executive director of the John Howard Society of Toronto. He said that while the society is not opposed to the idea of prison work programs, the work should help inmates develop skills that will get them a job when they are released.
As well, Rogers said, the work should not take time away from time spent on rehabilitation and addressing the problems that landed an inmate in jail in the first place.
"This is Tim Hudak’s catch-and-release approach to crime," Minister of Community Safety and Corrections Jim Bradley said in response the announcement. "Hudak’s reckless proposal would endanger communities by putting literally thousands of convicted criminals in our parks and residential neighbourhoods where our kids and families are."
Bradley said Ontario’s inmates already work inside jails in laundries and kitchens, as well as in supervised workshops producing uniforms, licence plates and bedding.
Chain gangs were once widely used in the southern United States.
Arizona still makes use of hard labour. Inmates in Maricopa County’s chain gangs perform tasks including burying the dead in paupers’ graves and clearing wasteland.
County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, known for his tough approach to corrections, even introduced chain gangs for female inmates.
"If they do something wrong they have to pay. It’s not a hotel," Arpaio was quoted as saying in the New York Daily Telegraph.
In Tennessee, inmates are required to work if they are not finishing their high school diplomas. They are paid between 17 and 54 cents per hour.
"Most of them want to (work)," said Dorinda Carter, a spokesperson for the Tennessee Department of Correction. The outdoor work crews are a source of cheap labour for cash-strapped county governments, she explained. The crews clean up parks, re-paint municipal buildings or help churches and other non-profit groups with work and are supervised by guards.
"They need some sort of incentive to want to better themselves," Carter said, explaining the rationale behind the work crews.
Several of Canada’s provincial correctional services confirmed to Postmedia News that participating in work crews is voluntary and subject to security screenings. Some programs pay inmates a minimal wage as well.
Earlier this month, inmates from four provincial jails in Manitoba volunteered to fill sandbags and helped to build dikes near Elie, Brandon, Portage-la-Prairie and Dauphin Lake to fight floods.
(More than 60 federal inmates from Rockwood institution in Manitoba also helped fill sandbags.)
British Columbia is perhaps the best-known province when it comes to using prison labour. Work, whether inside or outside in a work crew, is mandatory for all sentenced inmates.
"It is essential to helping them successfully reintegrate into the community," a spokesperson for the Ministry of Public Safety told Postmedia News in an email on Thursday.
Depending on the level of security risk posed, inmates in two correctional centres also can work on outdoor crews at a local farm or fish hatchery. Inside, all inmates have duties, such as cleaning or doing laundry.
To help inmates develop work skills, the correctional service also offers vocational programs in areas such as bicycle mechanics and carpentry.
Ontarians go to the polls Oct. 6.
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