The shut-down of building company ISG has stopped work on two-thousand prison cells making the current jail space problem even worse. The government which already let three-thousand inmates go early this summer due to space issues now faces more trouble with repairs
In the old prison system many buildings need fixing. The historic HMP Dartmoor (built way back in 18th century for Napoleonʼs soldiers) sits empty after they found dangerous gas inside; all its 640 prisoners had to move somewhere else. The company was fixing 27 different jails when it went broke
At HMP Manchester - a 150-year old building theres lots of problems with security. Inmates made holes in windows to get stuff from drones (like phones and drugs); now nobodyʼs there to fix these windows. A check-up done last month showed that cameras dont work right and new windows arent installed yet
- Birmingham jail has 600 spaces that need fixing
- Three open prisons were getting 780 new spots
- HMP Guys Marsh was supposed to get 180 cells
- Manchester needs new security systems
The government rules say they cant just give the work to other builders - they need to start everything from zero. “Tools are locked up and finding new companies is hard“ a worker (who cant say their name) told us; but ministry people say ISG wasnt their only builder
We are currently working through our contingency plans to minimise the impact
About 42% of all 119 prisons got bad ratings this year - thats worse than before. Some places have rats damp and bugs; even the fancy security stuff at high-risk jails isnt working right