Chris Grayling, who daily demonstrates how out of touch he is with the way the law works, is at it too.
Prisoner rehabilitation, he proposed, will be handed over to companies or charities who would be paid by results ie non re-offending. Each prisoner will have a mentor to help them find housing and training opportunities.
It sounds an excellent idea in principle.
Let's not ask difficult questions about 'not re-offending on what timescale?' and 'What responsible body would take on a job like that when the risks of failure and thus not getting paid were so high?' Let's ask an expert.
Baroness Corston, who admittedly had something of a political axe to grind being a Labour peer, but has the very slight benefit of having carried out a major review of rehabilitation, publishing her report in 2007, has pointed out that what he is proposing is exactly the opposite of what everyone had been working towards: a single scheme coordinated at the centre. She thinks it will not work.
Why ask someone who knows what is needed before announcing something completely out of the blue?
