A working class schoolgirl launched a scathing criticism of Tory plans announced in the Queen's Speech this week to give prisoners iPads to aid their rehabilitation.
During the Question Time debate on Thursday evening, Conservative MP Amber Rudd bore the brunt of the attack before other audience members - including a serving prison officer - chipped in with their own views.
The debate centres around plans announced in the Queen's Speech on Wednesday.
The biggest shake-up of Britain's prison system since the Victorian era was at the heart of the announcement.
One of Europe's biggest jails, HMP Wandsworth, is among the half dozen institutions where governors will be given sweeping new powers over all key areas of management.
More than 5,000 inmates at the jails, which also include HMP Holme House, HMP Kirklevington Grange, HMP Coldingley, HMP High Down, and HMP Ranby, will be ruled over by the new regime.
Under the initiative governors will get much greater financial and legal power over areas such as budgets, opting out of national contracts, operational control on education, family visits, and partnerships to provide prison work and rehabilitation services.
Number 10 said the move - along with an overhaul of prison education - will see social reform and "extending life chances" promoted as the key themes of the legislative programme.
Prime Minister David Cameron said: "This is a one nation Queen's Speech from a one nation Government. It sets out a clear programme of social reform, so we break down the barriers to opportunity and extend life chances to all. And nowhere is that reform needed more than in our prisons.
"For too long, we have left our prisons to fester. Not only does that re-inforce the cycle of crime, increasing the bills of social failure that taxpayers must pick up. It writes off thousands of people.
"So today, we start the long-overdue, long-needed change that our prisons need. No longer will they be warehouses for criminals; they will now be places where lives are changed."