CON AIRWAVES
Jailbirds run own TV shows
IT’S the kind of daytime TV that gives a whole new meaning to Escape To The Country.
Prisoners are being trained to produce their own telly shows in a rehabilitation scheme.
They’re being put to work on a jail TV channel that airs midmorning staples like cookery shows and health reports.
The lags can even practise their
“TV voice” in a recording studio at Category C Buckley Hall, a 450-capacity training prison near Rochdale, Greater Manchester.
A source said: “There is some real star quality behind prison walls. It’s about inmates tapping into their talents.” The course was revealed when a prison watchdog praised the jail for “raising the educational bar” and offering training in work which “appeals to a wider audience”. The move comes after another jail, Berwyn in Wrexham, North Wales, began training prisoners as newsreaders for behindbars bulletins. The Prison Service said all jail radio and TV broadcasts are shown only inside and are checked by chiefs before going out. All the shows can boast a “captive audience”. Jails already have a National Prison Radio, which hosts a daily breakfast show named Porridge.