3,500 extra days of imprisonment imposed at Shropshire jail
More than 3,500 days of additional imprisonment were imposed on prisoners who were found to have broken rules at Shropshire's only prison last year, a report has revealed.
The report, published by the Howard League for Penal Reform, shows that 3,693 days of added prison time were imposed on prisoners at Stoke Heath, near Market Drayton.
Nationally, the report reveals almost 160,000 days – or 438 years – of additional imprisonment were imposed on prisoners found to have broken prison rules last year.
Elsewhere in the West Midlands, 4,934 days of additional imprisonment were imposed at Oakwood, 3,288 at Brinsford, and 2,491 at Featherstone.
The report, 'Punishment in Prison: The world of prison discipline', looks at how jails in England and Wales operate disciplinary hearings called adjudications, where allegations of rule-breaking are tried.
The hearings, which cost between £400,000 and £500,000 a year in total, mainly concern disobedience, disrespect or property offences, which increase as prisons lose control under pressure of overcrowding and staff cuts.
A prisoner found guilty at an adjudication can face punishments ranging from loss of canteen to solitary confinement and extra days of imprisonment.
The report reveals that the number of adjudications where extra days could be imposed has increased by 47 per cent since 2010.
The number of extra days imposed on children has almost doubled in two years – from 1,383 in 2012 to 2,683 in 2014 – even though the number of children in prison has almost halved.
The rise in the number of adjudications has come at a time when prisons across England and Wales are struggling to overcome problems caused by a growing prisoner population, chronic overcrowding and cuts of almost 40 per cent to frontline staffing.
Violence and self-injury in prisons are at their highest levels in a decade. In addition, there have been eight suspected homicides during 2015 – the highest number in a calendar year since current recording practices began in 1978.
Frances Crook, chief executive of the Howard League for Penal Reform, said: "?The system of adjudications has become a monster, imposing fearsome punishments when people misbehave often as a result of the dreadful conditions they are subjected to.
"This bureaucratic, costly and time-consuming system of punishments then further feeds pressure on the prisons, creating a vicious cycle of troubled prisons and troubling prisoners.
"The principle of independent adjudication where liberty is at risk is an important one. ?But prisons have come to rely too heavily on the threat of additional days. The Ministry of Justice should curtail the use of additional days in all but the most serious cases.
"The overuse of adjudications is not seen as fair, it is not fair, and the imposition of additional days is very expensive and counterproductive."
Responding to the report, a Prison Service spokesman said it was "right" that offenders who break prison rules were properly punished.
