Cash-strapped prison spends £10,000 teaching inmates to click their fingers

Inmates are encouraged to use different parts of their body to make noise alongside pop music, according to The Sun.

Songs popular with the prisoners include Happy by Pharrell Williams and Can’t Stop the Feeling by Justin Timberlake.

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A year-long contract was given to Wiltshire based firm Kaboom! to run the musical workshops in the prison.

The deal cost £9,600, according to the Ministry of Justice (MOJ).

The Prison Service said: “Schemes like this help cut crime, which protects the public and saves taxpayer money.”

HMP Dartmoor had failed to provide adequate living conditions for its prisoners, according to a recent inspection.

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The investigation revealed that inmates were kept locked in their cells for too long.

Bad behaviour in prisons has been on the rise.

According to the MOJ, in June 2023, the rate of assaults in prisons was 285 assaults per 1,000 prisoners.

This is a rise of 9 per cent from the previous year.

A Labour source said: “Our prison system is in total chaos. This move beggars belief and would be laughable if the Tories weren’t utterly incapable of keeping the public safe.”

The musical workshops have been commissioned in order to minimise stress and reduce anger.

According to researchers, producing music helps calm people and has been used in prisons to help with rehabilitation since the mid-nineteenth century.

From inmates getting involved in a choir to learning to play a musical instrument, developing a new hobby can help reduce blood pressure and stress levels in inmates, research suggests.