3 in 4 UK prisons overcrowded: Report

A new report has revealed that three in four prisons in England and Wales are overcrowded due to a growing prison population and the coalition government’s austerity cuts, including jail closures and staff layoffs.

The charity Howard League for Penal Reform released the report on Monday after analyzing figures from the Ministry of Justice.

According to the data, on a typical day, almost 19,000 inmates were doubled-up, meaning two prisoners were incarcerated in a one-man cell, and about 800 others were trebled-up, meaning three were put in a two-man cell.

The report said the most overcrowded prison was Leeds in northern England, which is designed to hold 669 prisoners while, in fact, 1,218 inmates were kept at the facility at the end of January. Other detention facilities with large overcrowding problems include Swansea, Wandsworth, Exeter, Preston, Durham and Doncaster.

The charity said the situation is a result of jails being forced to cram more inmates into cells amid growing prisoner numbers and other jail closures as well as prison staff cuts.

The figures showed that, in the two years to January 2015, 10 detention centers were shut down and two others were converted to immigration detention centers, while the prison population grew from 75,374 to 78,935.

Frances Crook, the Howard League chief executive, said Prime Minister David Cameron’s coalition government must tackle the prison crisis “that is feeding the crime problem and creating more victims.”

“Caging men in squalor with nothing to do all day is never going to help them become law-abiding citizens on release,” said Crook, adding, “Far too many people are being sent into already overcrowded jails and the need to stem the flow is now urgent.”

Prisons Minister Andrew Selous rejected the findings, saying jail overcrowding is currently at its lowest level in seven years and the prison population levels are “safe.”

“We always have enough space within our prisons to accommodate all offenders, and will never be in a position where we can’t imprison those sentenced by the courts,” said Selous.

A separate report published on the same day by the charity INQUEST showed that 65 young adults and teenagers have died in four years while being detained in prison. The most common cause of death was suicide.

The INQUEST report accused British authorities of not learning from previous fatal incidents, saying the data “exposes a litany of systemic neglect, institutionalized complacency and short-sighted policies.”

The two separate reports follow a recent government admission of an increase in prison violence. In the 12 months to the end of June 2014, a total of 15,441 assault incidents took place in jail, the highest rate in six years.

CAH/HJL/HRB

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