Cash crisis prompts spending freeze at prisons
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Emergency cuts in spending on jails could lead to riots and suicides among inmates, prison authorities were warned as they ordered urgent action to combat a financial crisis.
Governors have been told to tighten their belts immediately because the Prison Service is heading for a £31m deficit this year. There will be an immediate freeze on staff and on repairs to dilapidated cells.
The order to economise coincided with a scathing report yesterday by Catholic bishops into the "scandalous" state of prisons, saying they were being used as society's "dustbin".
Phil Wheatley, the service's director general, has ordered governors, in a memo seen by The Independent, to avoid all "discretionary spending" over the next four months. The financial hole has emerged partly because money has been diverted from prison budgets into other Home Office areas.
In the memo, Mr Wheatley acknowledges that prison activity might have to be scaled back and that some jail wings might have to be mothballed.
Frances Crook, director of the Howard League, said: "If you cut staff numbers and don't look after the fabric of buildings, it will put staff and prisoners at risk."
David Davis, the shadow Home Secretary, said the memo proved the Home Office was in financial chaos. He said: "The whole thing is a shambles and highlights the real reason the Government is actively encouraging its early release scheme. Prisoners released early to save money, but before undergoing proper rehabilitation, are likely to commit further crimes - it will be the public who pay the price of this disastrous financial mismanagement."