Britain’s prisons show up wider flaws in government

No long-term planning. Disjointed decision-making. Tension between expert advice and political calculation. The covid-19 inquiry has been the best place this week to see the flaws in Britain’s government laid bare. Largely hidden from public view lies another: a crisis in the country’s prisons. Those same factors have left some parts of the criminal-justice system .Start with the lack of long-term planning. In October it was revealed that the number of inmates in English and Welsh prisons is just a few hundred short of their maximum capacity. This should surprise no one. Along-standing push to be tough on crime has coincided with a more recent imposition of spending cuts. His Majesty’s Inspectorate of Prisons has repeatedly reported that jails are overcrowded, squalid and unsafe. The number of people in jail is nearly double what it was three decades ago; prison-building has not kept pace.