More foreign prisoners to be deported to free-up cells

More foreign prisoners are to be deported home under plans to tackle the prison overcrowding crisis.

Justice Secretary Alex Chalk has already signalled reforms including sending fewer “low-level offenders” to prison.

Last week judges were told to delay the sentencing of convicted criminals on bail – raising concerns some of the most serious offenders may not be sent to prison and left on bail instead.

Foreign criminals can be removed up to a year before the end of their sentence.

This will be brought forward by six months under new plans expected to be announced by Mr Chalk later on Monday – in a move the government claims will save £70,000 per inmate.

The Ministry of Justice said more than 3,100 foreign criminals have already been removed in the year to March, but 10,500 remain locked up in England and Wales.

More caseworkers will be deployed to speed up removals.

Officials are also looking at what more can be done to remove foreign offenders convicted of less serious offences more quickly, with plans as well to introduce new conditions to ban those convicted from returning to the UK.

It comes amid serious concerns about overcrowding in British jails, with official figures showing the prison population to be at 88,225 in England and Wales.

“It’s right that foreign criminals are punished but it cannot be right that some are sat in prison costing taxpayers £47,000 a year when they could be deported,” Mr Chalk said.

“Instead of letting foreign nationals take up space in our prisons at vast expense to the law-abiding public we will take action to get them out of the country and stop them from ever returning.”

Writing in The Sunday Telegraph, Mr Chalk said sending less serious offenders to prison was the “wrong use” of the system.

He suggested prisoners could instead clean up neighbourhoods, scrub graffiti off walls or plant forests.

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Shadow justice secretary Shabana Mahmood said: “Removals of foreign national offenders have plummeted by 40% since 2010 under the Conservatives.

“This half-baked plan is a huge admission of failure by the government. Labour has been calling for years for the Tories to get a grip on the increasing numbers of foreign offenders in our prison system and yet no action has been taken.

“Labour has a fully costed plan to recruit 1,000 more staff to a new returns unit in the Home Office, funded by ending the use of costly hotels to house asylum seekers, currently costing the taxpayer £8m a day.

“We will get on top of the prison crisis by prioritising the delivery of all 20,000 prison places. We need to put criminals behind bars where they belong.”

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