A COURT has rejected a prisoner's bid for a review into whether or not he has a "right" to be rehabilitated in jail.

Alex Keenan, who is currently serving a sentence of nine years and seven months, was seeking a judicial review looking at whether or not the state has a duty to provide him with courses to promote rehabilitation.

Currently, prisoners who have an indeterminate sentence, with no fixed date for their release, must be offered the chance to rehabilitate through courses and other measures.

However, those who have a determinate, fixed sentence - such as the sentence being served by Mr Keenan - do not have the same entitlement.

Mr Keenan will be eligible for parole on November 20 this year, but if he is not released at that point he will be freed on a non-parole licence in June 2018.

A Court of Session judgment on the case states that Mr Keenan was trying to show that "the respondents have failed to provide the petitioner with a means by which he could demonstrate to the Parole Board for Scotland that he no longer poses a risk to the public and therefore be eligible for release when first considered by the Parole Board".

Mr Keenan's lawyer also argued that there are parallels between long-term determinate prisoners and those serving indeterminate sentences which "give rise to similar duties" by the Scottish Ministers.

However, Judge Lord Boyd stated: "I am not persuaded that there are such parallels or, if there are, it gives rise to similar duties on behalf of the respondents."

The judge rejected the request for a judicial review claiming it had no reasonable prospects of success.