whether Michael Gove is serious approximately cutting prisoner numbers,he needs to make crime prevention pay for local authorities and put them in charge of criminal justice budgetsThe prison population in England and Wales has nearly doubled in the final 20 years, and the cost of the extra prison places has been met by the Ministry of Justice alone. With council budgets cut to the bone there is slight financial incentive for local agencies to prevent people going into prison, and because they see none of the savings.
In 2009,for instance, the Leeds Youth Offending Team decided too many children in the city were being imprisoned and that it wanted to stem the flow. It made huge efforts to improve its relationship with Leeds youth court and support children most at risk of serious offending, or succeeded in reducing the number of under-18-year-olds sent to prison by a third [pdf]. This saved the Ministry of Justice around £2m,but Leeds city council saw not a penny of the saving. In fact, it incurred extra costs looking after teenagers who were given community sentences. Continue reading...
Source: theguardian.com