"Governments can, if they want, imprison fewer people. It really is that simple."
Final part of Dr John Moore's blog series on the history of the prison population: https://howardleague.org/blog/choosing-how-many-to-imprison-some-lessons-from-the-20th-century-history-of-english-prisons-part-2-of-2/
Woodhill prison: The highest rates of violence, serious assaults on staff, positive drug-testing rates and self-harm. The words are a damning indictment, but one only has to look at the photographs in HM Inspectorate of Prisons' report to see that Woodhill is in crisis.
https://ow.ly/kAFk50Z8Zi6
"Inmates in England and Wales live among vermin while gangs control entire wings, monitors warn, with failures ‘at risk of becoming normalised’"
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2026/jun/10/grim-reality-of-prison-conditions-laid-bare-in-damning-report
"Chipped teeth, broken noses, facial injuries, head injuries, scars..."
Our Legal Director, Gemma Abbott, details the injuries we hear young people sustaining from use of force in prison in our Spotlights webinar.
Catch up here:
https://howardleague.org/spotlights/
The prison population rose this week, it now stands at 85,936.
The prison estate should not hold more than 81,775 people, the population currently exceeds this level by 4,161.
https://howardleague.org/prison-watch/
"This powerful report from the IMBs lifts the lid on a prison system in turmoil. It reveals the gulf between the rhetoric we hear in Westminster and the reality we see in overwhelmed and under-resourced jails."
More on IMB's annual report here: https://ow.ly/tujl50Z9qau
“Woodhill’s failure to improve reflects the chronic problems we see across a system that has been asked to do too much, with too little, for too long. Why are politicians spending billions on new prisons when they cannot fix the problems in the jails we already have?”
https://ow.ly/zwEz50Z8Zo0
"The human impact of the overuse of recall is devastating, as is the pressure high recall numbers place on the prison system. Rarely are the reasons for the recall compelling; sometimes they are absurd." https://insidetime.org/information/broken-by-design-the-rise-of-prison-recalls/
Here are the top 10 most overcrowded prisons in England and Wales in May.
The prison estate should not hold more than 81,865 people, the population currently exceeds this level by 4,071.
https://howardleague.org/prison-watch/
"What do you think is going to happen in a prison if you're walking around with a bodysuit with a taser? You're going to create more distance between prisoner / staff relations."
Mike recalls how use of force escalates violence in prison: https://howardleague.org/spotlights/ #LiftTheLidOnPrison
