Tories pledge to slash overseas aid budget to fund ‘biggest prison increase since Queen Victoria’

Tories pledge to slash overseas aid budget to fund ‘biggest prison increase since Queen Victoria’ The Tories said their plans would see the vast majority of extra spaces created over the course of a single Parliament and the full increase would be complete within seven years - Bookmark - CommentsGo to comments Become an Independent member to bookmark this article Already a member? Log in Kemi Badenoch has vowed to build 50,000 extra prison spaces by cutting the foreign aid budget down to £1 billion annually in an effort to bring an end to the early release of offenders. The Conservatives stated that most of the new places would be created within a single parliament, with the full quota achieved inside seven years. Throughout the 14 years the party spent in government, a net figure of roughly 500 places was added, factoring in 14,142 spaces built in new and existing institutions against 13,660 lost chiefly through closures and deterioration. Mrs Badenoch accepted that the capacity delivered by the previous Conservative government was "nowhere near enough". But she added: “We now have a plan to solve this issue and build 50,000 new prison places, the biggest prison increase since Queen Victoria, instead of papering over the cracks, investing £2 billion a year in our prisons and reversing Labour’s dangerous early-release schemes. “The first duty of government is to keep law-abiding people safe. “Full prisons are a reason to build more cells, not release more criminals onto our streets.” Labour chairwoman Bridget Phillipson said the Conservatives were “taking the public for fools” after their record in power. “Now Kemi Badenoch expects the British people to believe they’ll build 50,000. These proposals are just not credible from a party who left our criminal justice system at breaking point,” she said. “Labour is fixing the broken system the Tories’ left behind so victims of crime get the justice they deserve.” To fund the prison places, international development spending would be slashed to £1 billion a year, down from a previous Tory pledge to reduce it from 0.3% of gross national income to 0.1% to help fund the proposals, the Conservatives said. The Department for Culture, Media and Sport budget would also be cut by £1 billion and spending on Cabinet Office communications reduced by £0.5 billion under the plans. The UK’s overseas aid has already been reduced significantly. The Independent has previously reported that the cuts were effectively more than twice as large as the current government announced last year, according to a analysis of official figures. The effective cut was at least £1.2 billion, at least £700m more than the £500m reduction announced by ministers, according to an estimate from Bond, the UK network for development organisations. In a bid to ease overcrowding, the former Tory government began releasing some offenders before the end of their sentences in 2023, which the current Labour administration has continued to do under a separate scheme amid ongoing capacity pressures. Following Prime Minister Andy Burnham’s decision to exempt prisoners guilty of manslaughter, grooming offences and causing or allowing the death of a child from the current programme, the number due to be freed early over the next year has been cut from around 6,000 to around 5,000. More than 70,000 prisoners have been let out of jail since 2024 under the Labour Government’s scheme, and more than 10,000 were freed up to 70 days early under the last Conservative administration, according to Ministry of Justice figures. Under the current process, offenders serving fixed-term sentences will serve a third of their time behind bars before being released, rather than half. Opposition leader Mrs Badenoch said the Government was still letting “dangerous offenders” out early and accused Labour of “papering over the cracks” after entering office without a plan to fix the problem. Echoing former Conservative home secretary Michael Howard’s mantra that “prison works”, she said “the first duty of government is to keep law-abiding people safe” and pledged to oversee the “biggest prison increase since Queen Victoria”. “A violent criminal doesn’t become less dangerous just because the Government has run out of prison cells,” Mrs Badenoch said. “Labour cancelled our plans to rent spaces abroad and now they are stuck. Their answer is to let dangerous offenders out even earlier instead of building the prison spaces we need. “And before we forced them to back down and reverse their reckless policy, they had planned to grant early release to rapists and serious child sex offenders including grooming gang leaders. “If someone keeps burgling homes, assaulting people, stealing or offending again and again, they should have to face the consequences for doing so in prison. “It is astonishing Labour came into government with no plan to build prison places.” Shadow justice secretary Nick Timothy said jail time works by “punishing and deterring, but most importantly by incapacitating” and that prison “should keep violent and repeat offenders away from the law-abiding public.” “Right now, we do not have the prison space to incarcerate those who commit serious crime or are repeat offenders,” he said. “Labour have presided over an early release crisis that has seen thousands of victims told that the perpetrators of the crimes against them will be let out of prison early. “And they have effectively abolished short sentences and custodial sentences for theft. Judges are deliberately handing out soft sentences to ease pressure on our prisons.” Reform UK’s home affairs spokesman Zia Yusuf said: “Over 14 years in government, the Conservatives – with Kemi sat round the cabinet table – built just 400 prison places to cope with the five million people they imported into the country. “The suggestion that they will now magically build 125 times more prison places than they managed while in office is pure fantasy. “These are the same Tories who betrayed our country for over a decade.” Join our commenting forum Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies Comments