Landline telephones are to be fitted in Scottish jail cells for the first time.

The Scottish Prison Service (SPS) said the new phones will replace mobile devices issued during the COVID pandemic, when visiting was restricted.

Inmates will be given 200 free minutes per month to call numbers on a pre-approved list, which the SPS will be able to monitor and record.

The SPS said the hard-wired landlines, which will cost £8.5m to install, will be “subject to the same robust security” as the mobiles and phones in the halls.

It is hoped the move will help support family contact, improve mental health and wellbeing, and reduce the risk of reoffending.

Angela Constance, Scotland’s justice secretary, described it as a “welcome development”.

She added: “This will help people in custody maintain contact with friends and family, including their children, which we know is crucial to their rehabilitative journey.

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“It will also pave the way for in-cell education and give people in custody greater responsibility for their own lives – and will help ensure safe and stable prison environments.”

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The SPS said the cabling used will help to support future ambitions for in-cell technology.

It is hoped that will “further support contact, increase educational opportunities, and give people greater agency over their own lives, from booking courses they wish to attend to selecting meal choices”.

Teresa Medhurst, SPS chief executive, said: “This is an important milestone for the Scottish Prison Service, which has the potential to deliver tangible and enduring benefits for those in our care and their families, staff, the wider justice sector, and Scotland as a whole.

“It is an example of how the SPS is taking the lessons learned in the extremely challenging circumstances of the COVID pandemic to improve the service we provide.

“I would like to thank all those colleagues who have worked so hard to deliver this.”

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