HMP Liverpool: Prisoners 'freezing' after heating failure

Urgent work is taking place to restore heating to one of HMP Liverpool's wings

Inmates at a jail once described as the UK's worst prison are living in freezing cells after a heating failure.

Urgent work is taking place to restore heating to one of HMP Liverpool's wings, the Ministry of Justice said.

Prisoners' families have told the Liverpool Echo that the inmates are borrowing layers of clothes from each other to keep warm.

An inspection report published in January 2020 said standards had improved dramatically over two years.

The prison has experienced problems with its heating system for a month, affecting different parts of the jail at different times.

A Ministry of Justice spokeswoman said: "We are working to urgently resolve heating issues at HMP Liverpool."

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Four years ago, inspectors found rats and cockroaches were rife in the Victorian prison, known locally as HMP Walton, with many inmates living in "squalid" conditions.

One area was deemed so dirty, infested and hazardous it could not be cleaned, while inspectors also found exposed electrical wiring and filthy, leaking toilets.

In his September 2017 report, Her Majesty's Chief Inspector of Prisons Peter Clarke found an "abject failure to offer a safe and decent" environment at the prison and said they were the "worst living conditions".

His January 2020 report, which followed an inspection in August and September 2019, concluded there had been a dramatic improvement at the Category B prison, which opened in 1855, but said more work needed to be done.

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