Cuts to education in prisons are derailing offenders’ work and training and ultimately endangering the public, the prisons watchdog has warned.
Repeat offenders “cause mayhem” in their communities because of the failure of prisons to provide education, training and work that could help to break the cycle of offending, the chief inspector of prisons, Charlie Taylor, said.
A thematic report from the inspectorate said “this already unacceptable situation” was only likely to get worse as real-terms cuts began to “eat into already stretched education provision”.
The Guardian disclosed last month that prisons were cutting frontline spending on education by up to 50%, despite promises from Keir Starmer to improve “access to learning” in last year’s general election manifesto.
The spending cuts are being introduced as the government rolls out new education contracts across prisons in England and Wales.
While the overall education budget has remained the same, the cost of course contracts has soared, governors claim.
Taylor said: “I have serious concerns about the impact of real-terms education budget cuts on already inadequate provision and about the lack of real appetite and ambition for improvement that this represents.
“The Prison Service has a duty to protect the public by making prisoners less likely to reoffend when they are released, but too often it is failing to fulfil this responsibility.
“There is little doubt that many prisoners already leave jail and return to criminality, creating more victims of crime. These devastating cuts are likely to make this situation worse.
“The best governors know that jails, and ultimately our communities, are safer if prisoners are purposefully occupied, and that education, training and work play a vital role in motivating prisoners to turn their lives around.
“Until leaders in the Prison Service take the provision of high-quality education and training more seriously, it is hard to see how appallingly high reoffending rates can be reduced.”
Labour promised to reduce reoffending in its manifesto and work with prisons to improve prisoners’ access to purposeful activity such as learning.
The cuts would also hinder Labour’s efforts to introduce a new incentive-based prison regime that would allow inmates to earn time off their sentence by completing work, training and education courses.
A report by the prison inspectorate found that 94 of 104 closed prisons inspected before the cuts came into effect this month were rated “poor” or “not sufficiently good” for purposeful activity.
Just 31% of prison leavers are in employment six months after release, according to Ministry of Justice figures.
The overall amount of money handed to education and training providers has not fallen but rising employment costs has forced them to cut provision of services.
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The review, which took place alongside inspections of 11 men’s and two women’s prisons, showed too many prisoners spent their days locked in their cells, and overcrowding, a lack of workshop space and instructors, equipment failures and ageing infrastructure had compounded the situation.
Many prisoners waited weeks to be allocated an activity space and were often given what was available, the report said, rather than training relevant to their career prospects on release.
For those who did gain a space, there was no guarantee they would be able to attend, the report said. Regime curtailments, security lockdowns and staff indifference about unlocking prisoners meant average attendance was just 67% in the prisons visited for the review.
Even when work went ahead, full-time jobs generally occupied prisoners for just five hours a day, with many roles split into part-time places to stretch meagre provision further, inspectors found.
Lord Timpson, the prisons minister, said: “I welcome this report and the challenges it brings. We inherited a crisis, and it is our job to not just sort the problem, but to create a justice system that is both sustainable and does its job of reducing reoffending.
“I have been involved in employing prisoners for over 20 years, and can confirm that we need prisons that work in giving offenders the tools they need, so when they are out of prison they stay out.
“We have already done a lot to improve our prisons, but given the scale of the crisis we inherited, there is clearly an awful lot more that still needs to be done.”
Timpson has repeatedly emphasised the importance of prison education and training.
In July, he wrote: “We know that purposeful activity can help to enable safe and decent prisons and have a transformative effect on reoffending rates … This is why the government committed to working with prisons to improve access to purposeful activity in its manifesto and is actively exploring the best approaches to do so.”
