Prisons chief backs weekend custody

The head of the Prison Service yesterday welcomed the concept of weekend jail to deal with the country's rapidly rising prison population.

The director general of prisons Richard Tilt said the idea of convicted criminals working during the week, then spending weekends in jail was "well worth examining".

Chris Scott, spokesman for prison governors, also described it as "an attractive proposition for society".

On Saturday Mr Tilt told The Independent that two disused military camps could be housing prisoners by the new year to deal with overcrowding.

His latest remarks, on BBC1's Breakfast with Frost, coincided with a call by the Chief Inspector of Prisons for an all-party approach to the treatment of prisoners in the wake of what he described as the "inexorable" rise in the jail population.

Sir David Ramsbotham's comments follow predictions that the total number of prisoners, currently just under 58,000, will increase by 11,000 following tough new sentencing measures by the Home Secretary, Michael Howard. Sir David said he hoped the prison building programme could cope with the 250-350 new prisoners going into jail each week.

But he warned: "The rise is inexorable. It's 10 per cent this year and looks like being 10 per cent next year.

"Therefore, I suspect the building programme is not something that's going to stop immediately after the emergency is completed."

Sir David called for the main political parties to reach a common approach to the treatment of prisoners.

"I wish that the containment and the looking after of prisoners was an all-party issue," he said on GMTV's Sunday programme. "Prisoners are going to be in prison whichever government is there. And I would like to see consistency in their treatment and I would like to see an all-party acknowledgment that what is being done to prisoners in prison is right as is what Parliament would like."

Sir David said he was concerned that cuts in resources for prisons was reducing the ability of prisons to help reform offenders, educating and training them for jobs.

"Statistics show that a prisoner who has got a home, a job and a family relationship when he comes out is less likely to reoffend than if not."

He said because of cuts, figures showed 56 per cent of prisoners had to reduce their education. "So it's not just places, it's this work that worries me, the work that's done with prisoners."

Speaking on the Frost programme, Mr Scott called for immediate action on over- crowding. "We cannot take any more prisoners. It is as simple as that. My association is saying this is not just a problem for the prison service system. It is a problem for the whole of the criminal justice system."

He said short-term prisoners could be released before the end of their sentences or fine-defaulters kept out of prison.

Mr Scott stressed he was not saying there would inevitably be prison disturbances if something was not done about the number of inmates - but responses could range from the normal way prisoners lodged complaints through to disturbances.