Image source, Getty Images
- author, Jennifer McKiernan
- role, Political reporter
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The justice minister is due to announce plans later to tackle overcrowding in prisons in England and Wales, following concerns that prisons could run out of space within weeks.
Shabana Mahmood said urgent measures were needed to “bring the justice system back from the brink of total collapse.”
The plans also include releasing some prisoners early, the BBC confirmed on Thursday.
Prisoners serving “standard determinate” sentences are scheduled to be released after serving 40% of their sentences instead of 50%.
In March, then-Attorney General Alex Chalk announced plans to release some prisoners up to two months early.
But Mr Chalk, who lost his seat in the general election, told the Today podcast he went further and also plans, announced today, to release prisoners who have served 40 per cent of their sentences, to reduce the number of people sent to prison in the first place.
BBC News understands that several Conservative ministers have supported the idea.
However, Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak refused to sign it and an election was called before the issue could be resolved.
The new chancellor, Sir Keir Starmer, said prison conditions were “shocking” and showed “gross irresponsibility” by the previous government.
Speaking at a news conference at the NATO summit in Washington, he said the Labour government “needs to take up this and fix it”.
Asked about the prison announcement at the summit, Sir Keir added: “We have far too many prisoners for our current and growing prison capacity.”
“There should be enough space to house the prisoners that judges send to prison.”
For the prison system to run smoothly, there need to be 1,425 free cells in men’s prisons, but media reports say there are currently only 700 spaces available.
The situation is so dire that “the criminal justice system is on the verge of collapse because there is a lack of space”, a former prison governor told the BBC.
Mark Ike, who was governor of Swaleside prison until 10 weeks ago, told the Today programme that the crisis was “unprecedented” and prison governors had “been warning for some time” that “we have too many prisoners”.
Ike is currently vice-president of the National Prison Governors Association (PGA), which welcomed the announcement, saying “no American should ever be put in this position again” and called for a “complete review”.
Asked whether raising the release rate for prisoners who had served 50 percent of their sentences to the current 40 percent was a necessary step, Icke said “this is the right thing to do for now” as “we have no other choice.”
The latest figures show there are currently 83,380 inmates held in adult male prisons and Icke believes the plan “will free between eight and 10,000 people and give us some breathing space”.
Asked whether violent prisoners could be released under the plan, he said he had “not heard the details yet.”
But he said he believed the Government was “listening to the advice given to them” and that “serious violent offenders, those convicted of sexual offences and those linked to domestic violence should be excluded”.
But the aunt of murdered law graduate Zara Arena slammed the plans as a “dangerous gamble with public safety”.
Arena was killed nine days after Jordan McSweeney was released from prison and was in the process of being reinstated after his license was revoked for failing to meet with his probation officer.
Ms McSweeney’s aunt, Farah Naz, told BBC Breakfast that a lack of funding for the probation service, which monitors prisoners released on parole mid-sentence, meant offenders like McSweeney were not receiving proper supervision in the community.
“That’s exactly what happened in our situation,” she said. “He was emboldened because he wasn’t supervised. He wasn’t judged. He was always allowed to do what he wanted.”
Rory Stewart, the former Conservative prisons minister who planned to abolish short sentences, said the prison crisis was an “utter disgrace” and the only solution was “putting fewer people in prison on shorter sentences”.
He told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme that the focus should be on people who have “committed truly horrific crimes” and said jailing people for minor offences was “completely insane”.
He added: “We need to be more patient in explaining that many people who are currently in prison should not be there. Putting them in prison actually puts society at risk because it destroys their lives and makes them more likely to commit crimes.”
The Ministry of Justice is already building six new prisons to create an additional 20,000 places to house solitary confinement, as demand for cell space rises due in part to a government campaign to hire 20,000 more police officers.
Around 6,000 spaces have been created, with around 10,000 spaces planned to be built by the end of 2025.
