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The government has prioritised the fight against poverty. However, one aspect of this will hardly play a role in the upcoming pension debate: the contribution and social security of people who spend a period of their lives in prison.
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Imagine being fobbed off with a rough third of the unqualified minimum wage for your work over the years. And then your work is not even taken into account when you reach retirement age. This is still the reality today for people serving a prison sentence in Luxembourg and working behind bars.
The main beneficiaries of prison labour today are private companies, some of which are obviously less interested in creating employment prospects than in maximising their profits, otherwise they would not be so keen to prevent their names from becoming public knowledge.
Everyone else is on the losing side. The victims of criminal offences with their claims to financial compensation that does not undo the suffering inflicted on them. The offenders, if they don't manage to save up enough money to somehow open up new prospects for themselves after their release, in addition to paying off the legal costs. And last but not least: the taxpayers.
Prisons cost the general public a lot of money. The prison administration manages a budget of around 134 million euros. However, convictions also entail indirect costs. People who are unable to find work due to their criminal record and may receive the Revis (Social inclusion income) for the rest of their lives. This is also because the potential for training and professional integration in prison is far from exhausted. Or they need therapy because they come out of prison physically and emotionally broken.
To fully revive the much-vaunted spirit of the 2018 prison reform and maximise the chances of "resocialisation" is a task the political decision-makers are still struggling with. The long overdue adjustment of salaries is still a long time coming. And even if the CSV/DP government must be credited with wanting to honour the promise of the three-party coalition to adjust the remuneration of prison labour, it is questionable whether this will ultimately be an evidence-based decision. After all, there are no income statistics.
Yes, certain things and procedures take time. But outsiders cannot deny the impression that these issues are not necessarily given high priority and that valuable time is being wasted on pilot projects (like transition programmes), studies and the like. Worse still, there were already plans to integrate prisoners into the social security system in the 1980s. Even then, the deputy attorney general at the time emphasised the importance of having a certain amount of starting capital at the time of release in order to make ends meet. In other words, to avoid ending up on the street. Which now seems to be increasingly undesirable.
"It is absurd to expect people to turn into good citizens after their prison sentence as long as the punishment does not consist exclusively of imprisonment."
Political decision-makers know that improving prison conditions will not win them a lot of sympathy or even, in the worst-case scenario, cause a lack of understanding. Because murderers or violent offenders sentenced to prison are, in the tone of some blunt comments on social networks, "still doing more than well enough", or in the opinion of the authors, criminals should be dealt with in a completely different way.
Of course you have to be realistic, people don't end up in a prison cell for no reason. Some people cannot be saved from relapsing into crime. But what about the others? Those who learn from their mistakes? It is absurd to expect people to turn into good citizens after their prison sentence as long as their punishment is not limited to imprisonment alone. And they also lack realistic prospects of finding work and housing when they are released. And yes: they are the ones who have to fight for it themselves in the first place.
Where stigma and prejudice prevail, political courage is needed. The pensions debate would be an opportunity to give concrete form to the vague formulations of the coalition agreement. And as a government to say: Of course those convicted by the justice system should also make a contribution to the common good and pay into the pension fund, for example. And at the same time to prove how seriously it really takes the fight against poverty. So that prison work pays off for everyone.
