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Labour has set out plans to ease pressure on overcrowded prisons by unblocking the planning process and expanding the prison building programme.
The party said the prison system had been “stretched to its limits” due to neglect and mismanagement by the Conservative government.
Earlier this year, the police commissioner was asked to detain fewer suspects due to prison overcrowding.
This follows plans to expand the early release scheme and release some prisoners up to 70 days early to free up solitary confinement.
Shadow justice secretary Shabana Mahmood said unblocking the planning process would stop a “powder keg waiting to explode” inside prisons.
The Conservatives have previously promised to create 20,000 new prison places – and have so far secured 6,000 – while Labour has said it will secure the remaining 14,000 places.
The plans also suggest prisons would be designated institutions of national importance and the power to approve planning decisions would be placed in the hands of ministers.
“The crisis in our prisons is a powder keg waiting to explode. What’s worse, we never needed to get to this point,” Mahmoud said.
“The dangerous overcrowding in our prisons was foreseeable and avoidable, but the current government has lacked the will or courage to act.”
“A Labour government would end 14 years of Conservative chaos and face the tough decisions that the current government has avoided.”
“We will increase prison capacity that was promised but never delivered, and we will reduce recidivism rates. I am determined to solve our prison crisis for the long term, not just postpone it for another day, week or month.”
The party also proposes setting up employment councils bringing together prison governors and local employers to reduce recidivism rates, link offenders to training and work and ease the strain on prison capacity in the long term.
A Conservative spokesman said: “The previous Labour government released 80,000 criminals early and failed to build the prisons it promised.”
“Keir Starmer’s Labour party continues to vote against increasing police budgets and tougher sentencing.
“Under the Conservative Government, we have overseen the biggest expansion of our prison infrastructure since Victorian times, creating 13,000 new places to keep criminals behind bars.”
Additional reporting by the Press Association