A £2.3bn boost to prison building was included in the government’s Budget announcement today (30 October).
The Treasury’s budget document said the investment in “prison expansion” covers the current fiscal year plus 2025/26.
This will ensure thousands of new prison places will become available by 2026, with the under-construction HMP Millsike in Yorkshire singled out by the government.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves referred to “overflowing” prisons in her Budget speech to parliament, and the Budget document stated that the prison system was running at “over 99 per cent capacity”.
Fewer than 500 new prison places were added in the period 2010-2024, it said.
The Budget also set aside £220m in 2024/25 and up to £300m the following year for prison maintenance.
Total departmental capital spending in the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) is expected to rise from £1.5bn in 2023/24 to £1.8bn in the current fiscal year and £2bn in 2025/26.
This means a £500m uplift or a 33 per cent increase over two years.
Kier is the main contractor for the Millsike job, which was awarded in 2022 as part of the previous Conservative government’s £5bn prison capacity expansion programme.
Construction of the all-electric prison is due to be completed next year.
Kier also has a place on a £2.5bn MoJ construction framework awarded in March 2023, along with fellow tier one contractors Morgan Sindall and Lendlease.
The five-year framework covers new-builds, refurbishment, maintenance and minor works across three lots.
Construction News reported in July that Kier was the main construction supplier to the MoJ with £294m of services in 2023/24, ahead of ISG (£145.9m) and Galliford Try (£67.5m).
The Conservative government’s 2020 spending review allocated funding of £4bn to build six new jails by the middle of the decade.
However, a House of Commons Library report in July this year described challenges around obtaining planning permission, with three proposed sites being rejected.
“While some early planning obstacles have been surmounted, these delays, coupled with challenging market conditions, mean the mid-2020s target is unlikely to be hit,” the report added.
