What are the numbers behind prison releases?
- Published
The recent cases of prisoners being mistakenly released has put a fresh spotlight on the demands facing the justice system.
Prison overcrowding, staffing levels and government funding have all been called into question.
How many prisoners have been released by mistake?
There were 262 prisoners accidentally released, external in the 12 months to March 2025, compared with 115 the previous year.
Of 121 prisons across England and Wales, 72 released at least one prisoner by mistake in 2024-25.
The overall number of releases has also increased - but not by as much.
There were just over 57,000 releases of prisoners who had finished the custodial part of their sentences in England and Wales in 2024-25. This includes the period when some prisoners were released after serving 40% of their sentence.
The year before there were about 50,000 releases. That's a rise in the number of releases of about 13% - a lot lower proportionally than the increase in errors.
One in 10 released from 'escort areas'
The majority of accidental releases were from a prison itself.
Pentonville Prison in London released the most in 2024-25 - 16, up from six the year before.
To put that in context, Pentonville had a population of just under 1,200 in March 2025. So that's equivalent to letting out more than one in every 100 prisoners by mistake over the year.
Another category of mistaken release is from "escort areas" - places where prisoners are being taken between prisons, to and from court hearings or to immigration removal centres.
Around one in 10 were released in error from these areas, the figures show.
However it's not clear from the data how many had been convicted or were in prison on remand, awaiting a trial or sentencing hearing.
Staffing challenges
At the end of June 2025, there were a total of 36,627 people working in prison service establishments across England and Wales.
That's 787 fewer people than a year ago, but well above the staff numbers in previous years.
However staff turnover is an ongoing issue.
In the year to June, nearly 13% of staff left the prison service, almost twice the 7.1% turnover rate across the Civil Service, external.
Half had spent a year or less in the job.
Sickness rates also impact operations.
In the year to June, prison staff missed an average of 12 days of work due to sickness. In two out of five cases, the absence was related to a mental health issue.
For comparison, average workers in the UK, external miss just over four days a year due to sickness.
Government funding
The mistaken releases have led to renewed questions over government funding for the justice system.
Former Conservative justice secretary Alex Chalk says the MoJ, which is responsible for prisons, the probation system, courts and legal aid, spends in a year the amount "spent by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) every two weeks".
MoJ is spending this year is around £13bn according to the National Audit Office, external - compared to the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), which spent nearly £276bn in 2023-24, external.
And, according to the Institute for Fiscal Studies thinktank, the MoJ is expected to be 5.6% smaller than it was in 2010 by the end of the current parliament.
