Jailing fewer criminals crucial to avoid running out of prison spaces

Jailing fewer criminals will be crucial to avoid running out of cells as demand rises ‘faster than we can possibly build’, the Justice Secretary said yesterday.

Shabana Mahmood insisted it will be necessary to expand ‘punishment outside of prison’ including greater use of tagging to avoid jails becoming full.

Documents from the Ministry of Justice show the jail population in England and Wales is projected to be ‘between 97,300 and 112,300, with a central estimate of 104,100’ in just under eight years. 

But, even including the impact of a building programme, only 99,000 jail places are due to be available by that point – meaning a shortfall of up to 13,000. 

It means Labour is relying on a sentencing review, already under way, to come up with a plan to jail fewer criminals.

Ms Mahmood said: ‘In the years ahead, population growth will exceed our ability to build new prison places.’ 

The sentencing review led by former Tory justice secretary David Gauke needed to ‘expand the range and use of punishment outside of prison’ to ‘curtail freedom outside of prison, just as we do on the inside’.

Earlier this year Ms Mahmood introduced an early release scheme which allows most criminals to be freed after serving 40 per cent of their sentence, rather than the previous 50 per cent.

‘I don’t want to be in a position where we ever do emergency release of the kind that we’ve had to do,’ she told Sky News. 

Other measures could include a potential expansion of the home detention curfew (HDC) scheme, which uses electronic tags, she told broadcasters.

The MoJ also revealed that beyond the four prison projects already begun, the Government has run out of sites to build new jails.

Ministers have ‘an ambition to secure new land in readiness should further prison builds be required in future’.