Howard promises new prisons to incarcerate more criminals.
Michael Howard is travelling to Sedgefield, Tony’s Blair’s constituency, to announce plans to build more prisons as part of the Tory election campaign to “restore order to Britain”. The scope of the plans is ambitious, requiring 20,000 more places within the next five years.
The Labour Party have questioned how the Tories would fund the scheme, which would cost, according to Conservative Party estimates, some £700 million. The plans have been criticised by penal reformers, who say that the money would be better spent on crime prevention.
