Drug mules Melissa Reid and Michaella McCollum have a beauty of a plan to get out of Peru jail

Caged drug mules Melissa Reid and Michaella McCollum have taken up beauty therapy in a bid to end their Peruvian jail hell.

Former cell-mate Lillian Allen, 49, says Reid and McCollum have landed a coveted role in a hair salon in the tough Ancon 2 jail.

Landing a job behind bars in Peru significantly increases your chances of being considered for parole.

And the pair sentenced to six years and eight months in 2013 for trying to smuggle £1.5 million of cocaine out of the country hope the sought-after beauty jobs will propel them towards freedom as their hopes of a prison transfer to the UK lie in tatters.

Belfast Gran Lillian, who served 36 months of an eight-year sentence in Peru for cocaine smuggling in 2011, said:“I made jewellery and some others sewed but getting a job in the hair salon is considered one of the top jobs.”

Lillian says Reid and McCollum began working by sewing purses and wallets but showed “little interest” in the harder work.

Instead, they waited to land the prized beauty therapy roles.

They work on other inmates’ hair and nails in the prison’s in-house salon.

After two salon workers were released from their jail stint, the British pair landed the plum jobs.

Mother-of-three Lillian said: “You quickly learn the best way out of that hell is to get parole.

“And you only get that if you show an appetite to work.”

Prisoners have to pay around £6.50-a-day for the privilege of work as well as covering the cost of the materials they use.

Foreign prisoners like Reid and McCollum are given cash by their family via the British Embassy in Lima.

Lillian was released on parole at the end of last year and was meant to stay in Peru for a further six months to comply with the terms of her parole.

But she said she feared she would be killed by shadowy drug criminals and fled back to the UK after bribing Peruvian cops. She now lives in fear of being re-arrested and sent back to Lima.

She said: “Peru is the most corrupt country I’ve ever been to. I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy.

“I got out as soon as I could.

“Melissa and Michaella were well behaved and kept their heads down.

“I pray the girls will make it back but I can’t see it being anytime soon.”

She said the caged drug smugglers are forced to endure “horrific” conditions.

“There are eight women in a cell with a hole in the ground for the toilet,” she said.

“The only thing that takes your mind off it is work.”

Last July we told how Melissa’s dad and mum, Billy and Debra, were toying with cancelling a trip to see their daughter because they hoped she was about to be transferred to the UK.

The family hoped a prisoner transfer which would see her serve the rest of her sentence in Scotland would be complete in time for her 21st birthday last August after Scottish authorities completed their side of the paperwork.

But since then their Peruvian counterparts have been silent.

Last night a spokesman for the Scottish Prison Service said: “We have not heard anything further regarding Melissa Reid.”

But a source close to the case said Reid and fellow con McCollum might never be transferred.

Instead, they said, they will “probably” be released on parole by Peruvian jail bosses in a deal similar to Lillian’s.