Prison overcrowding predicted despite investment
13 Jun 06
Prison Service business plan shows demand outstripping supply by 2011
The £272 million spent on rebuilding prisons since 1999 will only end overcrowding for a year, according to a report by the Scottish Prison Service (SPS).
The prison service's business plan is due to be presented to Holyrood's Justice 1 Committee tomorrow. It predicts the prison population will rapidly outgrow capacity. In 2008-09, capacity should exceeed demand, but by 2011-12 the plan predicts the prison system will be holding 300 more prisoners than it was designed for.
An estates review announced by the Scottish Executive in 2002 resulted in major investment in Edinburgh, Perth, Barlinnie, Glenochil and Polmont.
However, the SPS report predicts design capacity will peak at about 7,250 cells in 2008-09 once two new prisons have been built at Addiewell, West Lothian and Low Moss, East Dunbartonshire.
By that time, the average daily prison population is predicted to be 7,200, but three years later it could reach 7,600.
This year the prison population has exceeded predictions. It was last calculated at 7,234, compared to a prediction of 7,000 and a design capacity of 6,378.
A spokesperson for the SPS said investment was not solely aimed at rebuilding prisons, but also at improving prison officers' working conditions and ending slopping out.
Conservative leader Annabel Goldie said it was time the Executive woke up to the problem of prison overcrowding, while Stewart Stevenson, the SNP's deputy convener of the Justice 1 Committee, said it was time the Executive invested properly in prisons instead of lawyers and legal costs over slopping out.