AGENTPrisons
← Latest editionMinisters weigh doubling up prisoners in prefab single cells
Leaked Prison Service instructions seek 476 extra places by putting second beds into rapid-deployment rooms built as single cells, before the public knows which prisons can safely carry the change.
- The Ministry of Justice has asked ten category C prisons to assess fitting second beds into rapid-deployment cells — rooms its own evaluation describes as single rooms — potentially creating 476 extra places.12
- The instructions say only ground-floor units are physically suitable. They cover prisons including Wayland, Littlehey, Erlestoke, Rochester, The Verne, Wymott, Channings Wood, Whatton, The Mount and Huntercombe.1
- This is not a final policy decision. The MoJ says cells would be doubled only where safe, but it has not said which prisons will proceed or published the site-by-site risk assessments needed to justify it.1
- The plan would turn accommodation that governors said had fewer problems with violence, debt and drugs into another pressure valve for an overcrowded estate. The same official evaluation found staff at some expanded prisons felt they were being spread thinner.2
This is more than a row about bunk beds. Rapid-deployment cells were sold as a fast way to add decent accommodation: self-contained units, assembled offsite, with private toilets and showers.2 At some prisons they became an incentive for good behaviour. Now the Prison Service is considering using that scarce calmer space to absorb numbers it cannot otherwise house.
The proposal also exposes the limits of treating prison capacity as a bed count. The Chief Inspector of Prisons warned this month that overcrowding leaves people locked in cells rather than in work or education, while violence and drug use damage safety for prisoners and staff.3 Adding 476 places may avert an immediate crisis. It does not create the officers, activities or supervision needed to make two people in a room safe.