IFG - More work and education in prisons could turn around declining performance

7 Mar 2025 03:20 PM

More work and education and increasing access to open prisons could turn around over a decade of strikingly poor prison performance in England and Wales, says a new Institute for Government report, funded by the Nuffield Foundation.

Published on Friday 7^th March, Inside England and Wales’s prisons crisis is the first in a new IfG series – funded by the Nuffield Foundation – on public service performance at the local level, and lays bare the shockingly high levels of violence, protests and self-harm and severely limited work and education opportunities for prisoners.  

The new IfG report, which combines statistical analysis of published data, interviews with experts and two prison visits, argues that widespread systemic problems like overcrowding and a lack of purposeful activity for prisoners – more than widespread failures by individual prison governors or particularly challenging prisoner cohorts – are causing severe and sustained decline. The report also shows how open prisons consistently outperform other categories of prison on a range of measures.

• In 2013, nearly two-thirds of prisons had fewer than 100 prisoner-on-prisoner assaults per 1,000 prisoners. By 2023, this was down to less than a quarter.
• Self harm incidents in the average prison are now five times higher than in 2004.
• In 2012/3, 13 ‘at height’ protesting incidents per 1,000 prisoners would have put a prison in the worst 20% of prisons. In 2023/24, the same rate would put it in the best performing 20%.
• There have been notable improvements in employment after release – with most prisons doubling the proportion of prisoners in employment six weeks after release – suggesting prisoners are not increasingly unwilling nor unable to work and reintegrate into society.
• Experienced, senior staff are crucial to a well-running prison: just adding more ‘boots on the ground’ doesn’t bring down violence or increase activity. 

But with some prisons continuing to stand out as high performers, the new IfG report says Keir Starmer’s government can learn from examples of successful prisons to deliver rapid improvements – and sets out four key recommendations to achieve this aim:

• Fund a ‘minimum regime’ with a required level of both participation and hours of purposeful activity per prisoner.
• Explore options for expanding access to open prisons and facilitate more and earlier access to open prisons
• Identify which elements of open prisons can be applied to other types of prison, such as more opportunities to exercise responsibility around the prison or release on temporary licence for employment in the community
• Build on successes targeting employment after release 

Cassia Rowland, report author, said: “The current situation in prisons is the dire result of systemic failings – but it is not irreversible. There are some straightforward steps the government could take to improve conditions and outcomes, such as increasing work and education and reducing crowding.”

The Nuffield Foundation

The Nuffield Foundation is an independent charitable trust with a mission to advance social well-being. It funds research that informs social policy, primarily in Education, Welfare, and Justice. The Nuffield Foundation is the founder and co-funder of the Nuffield Council on Bioethics, the Ada Lovelace Institute and the Nuffield Family Justice Observatory. The Foundation has funded this project, but the views expressed are those of the authors and not necessarily the Foundation. Website: www.nuffieldfoundation.org | Bluesky: @nuffieldfoundation.org | X: @NuffieldFound