It is time to renationalise the prisons after HMP Birmingham scandal, says UKIP

G4S-run HMP Birmingham has been taken over by the Government after it was found that law and order had broken down in the prison.

It has been revealed that prisoners were openly smoking illicit substances and terrorised prison staff who locked themselves in their offices for their own safety. Prisoners also hazed one another by forcing fellow inmates to consume cockroaches found among the squalid conditions of the prison.

UKIP Leader Gerard Batten commented:

"The privatisation of prisons is a failed experiment. It doesn't even save money. Somebody detained at Her Majesty's pleasure should only ever be the responsibility of an officer of the Crown answerable to a minister.

"Prison privatisation should now be halted and reversed. Governments should spend the necessary amount of money on prisons to protect prisoners from each other and to ensure that they are safely held to protect the general public."