The NAO has described the plan as “unrealistic and not prioritised”.
The Tories’ plan to deliver 20,000 more prison places by the mid-2020s is expected to cost between £9.4 and £10.1 billion, at least £4.2 billion, or 80% more than planned three years ago.
In 2021, HM Prison and Probation Service was allocated an estimated £5.2 billion to deliver the 20,000 additional places.
A report published today by the National Audit Office (NAO) reveals that only 6,518 of the 20,000 additional prison places promised by the Conservative government have been delivered.
The NAO has referred to the Tories’ plan as “unrealistic and not prioritised”.
The public spending watchdog has found that the plans will not be delivered until 2031, will cost far more than estimated, and will not meet the rising demand for places projected by the Ministry of Justice (MoJ).
It said that the MoJ currently projects a shortage of 12,400 prison places by 2027, if demand increases according to its forecast.
According to the report, the MoJ is relying on the former justice secretary David Gauke’s Sentencing Review to reduce demand for prison places and close the gap.
The justice secretary Shabana Mahmood has said that “prison isn’t working” for women and wants to reduce the number of women who are jailed.
More broadly, Mahmood wants the review to look at community alternatives to prison and the use of fines.
Andrea Coomber KC, Chief Executive of the Howard League for Penal Reform, said: “This scathing report underlines a fact that the new government has recognised – we cannot build our way out of the prison capacity crisis.
Coomber said “finding a solution is not simply a matter of supply; we have to reduce demand on a system that has been asked to do too much, with too little, for too long.”
“When the prison system gets bigger, the problems within it get bigger, becoming harder to solve.”
She added that “the billions of pounds earmarked for building new prisons would be better invested in securing an effective and responsive probation service, working to cut crime in the community.
“And it makes no sense to build more jails when the ones we already have are understaffed, falling apart, and failing to help people to move on from crime.”
Pia Sinha, chief executive of the Prison Reform Trust, said: “This damning report lays bare the negligence of previous governments and their approach to penal policy. This has left taxpayers facing an eyewatering £4.2bn bill with no certainty on when the ongoing prison capacity crisis will end.
“Politicians have been dishonest with the public — promising to lock people up for longer but failing to provide the prison places necessary or being upfront about the costs of doing so. This cannot continue.
“The findings of this report should give impetus to the government’s sentencing review to bring forward bold proposals to place our use of imprisonment on a more sustainable and proportionate footing”.
Olivia Barber is a reporter at Left Foot Forward
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