Britain's prison population has multiplied by more than 300 a week, taking the total population to 87,668, which means 3,500 higher than at the same time last year...
Jan 27, 2012
Britain's prison population has multiplied by more than 300 a week, taking the total population to 87,668, which means 3,500 higher than at the same time last year.
The latest figures published by the justice ministry showed that one of the biggest risks the UK is facing is the rapidly rising costs of the prison population, British media reported.
Sir Suma Chakrabarti, the justice ministry's permanent secretary, told lawmakers at the House of Commons that the increase in prison numbers was the biggest rise after the Christmas 'dip' for several years.
Chakrabarti warned that "if that rate of rise continues we will have to revisit all the figures" in the budget fixed last October.
He admitted that the defeats suffered by the justice secretary, Ken Clarke, over his sentencing reforms, including his move to increase the discount for early guilty pleas, had meant that plans to make savings by closing some prisons had been dropped.
"They were changed, so some of those savings are not going to be met through closing capacity necessarily, but through further efficiencies instead," he said.
The renewed rise in prison numbers also deals a blow to Clarke's hopes of reducing and then stabilizing the prison population at about 82,000 by the time of the next general election.
The justice ministry is already facing a fierce parliamentary battle over implementing £350 million of legal aid cuts and is pressing ahead with significant savings in the courts, prison and probation budgets.
The population figures published on Friday show that 87,688 inmates are being held in a prison system with a "usable operational capacity" of 89,399, giving prison managers an operating margin of 1,721 places.
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