Crowded Jails ‘Make Scotland More Dangerous’

Overcrowded jails are making Scotland a more dangerous place, the chief inspector of prisons has said.

Dr Andrew McLellan said the prison system was failing inmates, staff and the public.

He highlighted the rise in the number of short-term inmates, who receive little or no rehabilitation if jailed for less than six months. Such people were more likely to re-offend, he said.

He told a BBC1 Scotland documentary: “Overcrowded jails mean Scotland is less safe, for the sake of us all we need to make sure overcrowding is defeated.”

The prison population hit an all-time high last year, with 7,497 people behind bars. Aberdeen, Inverness and Glasgow’s Barlinnie prisons are the most overcrowded.

Barlinnie – Scotland’s largest jail – is around 50 per cent over its capacity with 1,500 inmates, said Dr McLellan, who has also stressed that building more jails will do “almost nothing” to solve the problem.

Kenny MacAskill, the Justice Minister, said the Executive was setting up a prisons commission under Henry McLeish, the former first minister.

The extension of the home detention curfew meant that non-dangerous criminals near the end of their sentence can be let out under supervision, he said, and other options to ease overcrowding were being looked at.

He told BBC Radio Scotland: “When you have difficult people banged up in difficult circumstances you have a volatile combination. We have to have prisons not simply to lock up those who are dangerous but to seek to rehabilitate them back into society.”

Mr MacAskill said only the “bad and dangerous” should be locked up, while the “stupid and feckless” should face alternative punishment.

Those with problems including mental health issues should be treated with “dignity and kindness”, he said.

The prison population stood at 7,284, exceeding the design capacity of Scotland’s jails by 658, according to the Service.

The beginning of the month saw a record high of 7,704 in custody, plus 379 on home curfew.

A spokesman for the Scottish Prison Service said: “It is the case that we are seeing a record number of people sent to prison. The increase has been in those who are on remand or serving short term sentences.”

Bill Aitken, the Tory justice spokesman, said: “The minority SNP government just doesn’t get it. You don’t cut crime by cutting the prison population. You cut the prison population by cutting crime. The sentence should fit the crime, not the available jail space.”

Mr Aitken said overcrowding should be tackled by cracking down on crime, rehabilitating prisoners in jails free from drugs and alcohol.

More prisons should be built if necessary, he said.

He added: “In the SNP’s soft-touch Scotland, public safety is compromised, the criminals come first and victims, their families and their communities come last.”