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Population of prisons hits 66000 record

Daily Telegraph

Friday 29 Jun 2001

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Population of prisons hits 66,000 record
By Philip Johnston, Home Affairs Editor


THE prison population in England and Wales rose to a record 66,611
yesterday, 60 per cent higher than eight years ago.

The rapid growth began in 1993, reflecting political and popular demand
for tougher custodial sentences after the murder of James Bulger. In
January that year there were 42,000 prison inmates as a range of
measures - including an extensive use of police cautioning, sentence
remission and parole - kept numbers down despite rising crime.

However, tougher criminal justice legislation which restored to courts
the power to take previous convictions into account when sentencing saw
the numbers begin to accelerate. By the time Labour came to office in
1997 the implementation of Tory plans for mandatory minimum sentences
for certain serious crimes had seen the numbers rise to almost 65,000.

Despite a slight fall in 1998 it has continued to rise. Since 1993 the
custody rate - the proportion of offenders sentenced to immediate jail
terms - has increased from 49 per cent to 62 per cent at the Crown court
and from six to 12 per cent at the magistrates' courts.

Sentence lengths in the Crown court have also increased by 10 per cent,
adding to population pressures. The population is forecast to reach
between 68,500 and 80,000, which would require up to 20 new prisons
costing billions of pounds. The system is already officially
overcrowded, as the "certified normal accommodation" for the 136 prisons
is 63,910.

In the Commons this week, David Blunkett, the Home Secretary, made penal
reform a priority. He said: "We shall be judged not by the people who
end up in prison but by the number we prevent from having to be sent to
prison. The number in prison is not a record to emulate but to
overcome."

There are now 125 inmates in British jails for every 100,000 members of
the population, the highest per capita rate in western Europe apart from
in Portugal. However, as a proportion of the number of crimes committed,
the number of inmates in Britain has fallen over the past 50 years.

 

 

 

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