Reid to take action over UK jail overcrowding

LONDON, Oct 9 (Reuters) Home Secretary John Reid announced measures today to address an overcrowding crisis in Britain's prisons, including housing inmates in police cells and putting men in women's jails.

The prison population has almost hit its capacity of around 80,000 inmates and Reid is now looking at what measures can be taken to deal with the problem.

Reid described new measures in a statement to parliament, saying some prisoners would be held in police cells, some would be moved to open prison, and some foreign prisoners would be deported more quickly.

Two women's prisons would be ''re-roled'' to house men, and the government was looking at housing prisoners in a former army barracks and a former hospital near Liverpool.

He said he had rejected a proposal to free some inmates early.

Longer sentences, high reconviction levels and shorter jail terms have pushed prison population numbers to record highs with just over 100 places left.

Yesterday, the most senior judge in England and Wales said prisons were too crowded to give proper rehabilitation, adding they were often used as ''social dustbins'' for drug addicts and the mentally ill.

''It is no answer to put more and more people in prison,'' the Lord Chief Justice, Lord Phillips, told the Observer.

''Emergency measures of keeping prisoners in police cells are highly undesirable,'' he added.

Reid said the ruling Labour government had built 16,000 prison places in the past nine years, at twice the rate of the previous Conservative government, and has already pledged to build another 8,000 places.

But he acknowledged that in the short term the prison population had risen sharply recent summer months, and had now reached 79,819.

Lord Phillips said more offenders should be given community-based punishments rather than jail terms.

Conservative home affairs spokesman David Davis said the government was to blame saying officials should have been aware of the growing crisis.

''Nothing is risk free now, the government's waited too long before it has acted,'' he told the BBC.

Reuters DKB DB2245