UK now Europe's jail capital

Britain is now the prison capital of western Europe, with an average incarceration rate of 139 for every 100,000 of population in England and Wales, and is even outstripping the jailing rate of Libya and Malaysia, according to official figures published yesterday.

The world prison population list published by the Home Office yesterday estimates that more than 8.75 million people worldwide are in jail - almost half of that number in the US (1.96 million), China (1.4 million) and Russia (900,000).

While Britain does not match the incarceration levels of those countries, the statistics confirm that its courts are far more punitive than those of Canada and Australia, and beat all those of its closest European neighbours, including courts in France (jailing 85 for every 100,000), Germany (96), and Spain (126).

Britain has now replaced Portugal as the jail capital of western Europe.

The figures were published yesterday as it was confirmed that a further £200m is to be spent building two private prisons, and extra wings and houseblocks in existing jails, as a medium-term solution to the overcrowding crisis.

Talks are still going on between the home secretary, David Blunkett, and the chancellor, Gordon Brown, over funding to expand the probation service to help introduce the new "custody minus" sentence as an alternative to prison.

The rapid growth in Britain's prison population, which this week stands at 72,144, and its impact on conditions for inmates, is confirmed in the annual prison statistics also published yesterday. They provide fresh evidence of the courts' ever more intense "love affair with custody".

The figures show that the justice system is not only sending more people to prison but also for increasingly longer periods.

In England and Wales the prison population has risen from 42,000 in 1991 to 72,000; the increasing custody rate at the courts was identified yesterday as the main factor.

In 2001 64% of all adults convicted in the crown court were sent to prison, compared with 45% in 1992.

That year the average sentence length for adults increased by five months to two years and two months, and a record 512 people were sent down for life. The number of inmates serving life sentences, which on average now means 13 years, has reached 4,810; three-quarters of them are murderers.

But the annual jail statistics show that overcrowding in prisons has meant that conditions have deteriorated, with the prison service failing to meet six of its 15 "key performance indicators" during 2001-02, including the level of assaults and the time spent in purposeful activity.

The average cost of keeping a prisoner inside has now reached £36,000 a year.

The figures show that the rise in prison numbers in the 1990s was also accompanied by a significant increase in the reconviction rate.

In 1993 53% of prisoners were found guilty of another offence within two years of leaving prison. By 2000 this percentage had risen to 59%, according to the figures published yesterday.

Juliet Lyon, of the Prison Reform Trust, said that since the figures had confirmed the prison reconviction rates had got worse and not better, it made no sense for the government to invest in building new prison places when the same money could buy effective drug treatment, adequate mental healthcare, and robust community sentences.

Harry Fletcher, of the probation officers' union, said it was extremely disappointing that Britain was the jail capital of western Europe and stressed the urgent need for ministers to promote community penalties for less serious offenders.