Overcrowded Welsh prisons putting safety at risk, say MPs

Overcrowding and staffing challenges in Welsh prisons are undermining the safety of staff and prisoners, MPs have warned.

A report by the Welsh affairs committee highlighted "serious concerns" about the Welsh prison estate.

Committee chair and Labour MP Ruth Jones said the system "too often fails the people it is meant to service" and the problems had "serious implications for safety and rehabilitation".

The Ministry of Justice said it was fixing a "prison system in crisis" with £7bn in spending to create hundreds of extra prison places in Wales by 2031.

The committee's cross-party report into criminal justice in Wales was told that prisoners often had to share cells that were originally designed for one person.

The chief inspector of prisons, Charlie Taylor, said that pressures are acute at Swansea, Cardiff and Berwyn in Wrexham.

Reasons given in the report range from funding, a higher recall rate for prisoners in Wales, and to the rise in the length of custodial sentences over the past 20 years.

The report concluded that alleviating pressures would depend "not only on new capacity but also on reducing reliance on custody, improving staff retention, and ensuring prisoners are held as close to home as possible."

Staffing was one of the main challenges to prisons that the report found.

In January 2024 40% of band three prison officers with supervisory duties at HMP Berwyn has been at the prison for less than 12 months.

The MPs said that ensuring enough staff with the right experience "requires investment in staff" and ensuring that their concerns around pay and conditions are heard."

Wales has no women's prison, and a planned residential centre in Swansea to house female prisoners from the local area is delayed.

In 2022, the Ministry of Justice announced that Swansea would host the first "ground-breaking" centre, supported by £10m funding and due to open in 2024.

But nothing has opened since - in their wide-ranging report, MPs urged the UK government to confirm the plans.

"These delays are unacceptable, as is the lack of clarity around how exactly the centre would operate and what its admissions criteria would be," wrote the MPs.

The current Plaid Cymru and previous Welsh governments have called for the justice system to be devolved, meaning powers would move from Westminster to Cardiff.

The UK government has rejected this, and in their report the MPs recommended that the UK government continue "to prioritise bringing stability to the prisons and probation service".

But the committee said this had to be "balanced with meeting its manifesto commitment to explore and consider the devolution of probation and youth justice".

The committee also highlighted the importance of oversight bodies called Independent Monitoring Boards which they found had "at times been unable to function effectively due to resource constraints".

"The deaths of 17 men at HMP Parc in 2024 underscore the need to have sustainably resourced IMBs operating across the estate," they added.

MPs also called for a review into why the imprisonment rate in Wales has consistently been shown to be higher than England, as well as in most of Western Europe.

The Welsh government said it intended to engage with the UK government on the issue in a "constructive manner".

A spokesperson added: "Only through devolution can we provide services in a joined‑up and efficient way that delivers for the people of Wales."

In December the UK government announced "the biggest jail expansion since the Victorian era", with plans for 14,000 extra prison places in Wales and England by 2031.

"The current devolution settlement ensures the people of Wales benefit from the shared resources of a larger justice system, and funding for certain youth justice initiatives is being devolved," the Ministry of Justice said.

"Our focus is on continuing to fix the justice system, including improved coordination of rehabilitation support to cut reoffending and meet the needs of Welsh communities."