tomorrow, justice secretary shabana mahmood will announce the government's plans to overhaul britain's

shabana mahmood has warned that jails in england and wales could run out of spaces within three years we will be increasing supply, even though we are investing in maintenance so that we don't lose cells to dilapidation, on their own that won't be enough. what we have published is both the supply line that shows that going up, but also the demand line, that is to say the demand for prison places which is going up at a much higher rate. the sad reality here is we cannot build our way out of this problem, we are going to build, we are going to maintain the cells that we have, and it still won't be enough, and that's why a few weeks ago i commissioned the independent review into sentencing so that we can try and make sure we are running a sustainable prison system, so there are a prison places available for those who have to be locked up, so that we can do a betterjob of helping some of those people turn their lives around, so we can cut crime when they come out, and also so that we can expand the range of punishments outside prison as well. fundamentally what we are trying to do is get

couple of days ofjubilation, and then come the next week, when the hangover hit, you heard from shabana mahmood we thought," and she and keir starmer announced they would release some prisoners earlier than they'd previously been released. but they said that was only ever a short—term measure. the reason david gauke's comments are really significant is because, they then said, "ok, but we've got to think about the medium and long term." part of that is building new prisons. they say they will build four new prisons over the next seven years. but part of that is reviewing how and why they put people in prison in the first place, and the man they asked to look at how to do that is david gauke. this is the first flavour of what direction he is going in, and it sounds a political pretty radical departure with how the uk has approached prison policy in recent years. and very briefly, in terms of timing, when are we looking at all of this being addressed? the recommendations are likely to come from david gauke formally to the government in the spring, so after that, you would expect the government to

shabana mahmood told the bbc that "building alone is not enough" to deal with the critical lack of spacek correspondent sima kotecha reports. 0vercrowded prisons — something we've heard lots about in recent months. staff unable to cope, inmates locked up for longer. in september, we witnessed the problems first—hand during an exclusive visit to hmp pentonville. staff were overstretched as they dealt with a prison at full capacity. day in, day out, you kind of are dealing with incidents from self—harm, to violence, to kind of... ..people with severe mental—health issues. ..people with severe mental—health issues. in the autumn, thousands of offenders were released early from prisons in england and wales in a controversial plan by the government to deal with the population crisis. they say this has freed up more than 5,000 spaces. now ministers have come up with a ten—year plan to create even more room — including building four new prisons over seven years, making more than 6,000 new places. it will also extend some prisons, build more temporary cells, and renovate those that are currently

there is shabana mahmood, the first bit is the capacity strategy, the new places. the sentencing review, being carried out by the former conservative justice secretary david gauke. as we can see, fewer prison sentences for less serious offences, but ensuring that there are spaces for the most serious offenders to serve sentences in prison. the bottom line is, fewer people will be going to prison. 0n people will be going to prison. on such a hot political potato, you can imagine there's a lot of politics around this. what is thejustice secretary saying? tomorrow she will say the last government pretended they could send people away for longer and longer, without building the prisons they promised. this strategy reveals that their prison building plans were years delayed and nearly 5 billion over budget. they left our prisons in crisis, on the edge of collapse, and from the conservatives, who knew counterpart robertjenrick, saying labour could be maximising court capacity and expert icing the deportation of foreign criminals, but they are rushing to release criminals

we know that wes streeting the health secretary, and the justice secretary, shabana mahmood, voted againstt, very opposed. how much are they going to get behind it? that's the sort of big question for the next few months. >> well, they may well share the public's fears, which are that the court service, which is already overburdened and plagued with delays, along with the nhs waiting lists still at 7 to 8 million, won't be able to cope with this. i mean, we've got no idea how many people are going to opt for it on a sort of daily basis. is it going to be one person, 1290 200? this is why people are scratching their heads wondering why on earth there was this sense of urgency when we have been discussing this for years, just can't quite understand why it's rushed through. lord sumption has written a quite compelling piece in the sunday times, basically making the point that, you know, yes, he can understand the arguments on both sides , but arguments on both sides, but what's the word he used? he says that the legislation is overengineered and coldly inhuman. >> yeah. i mean, and he says th

we'll examine the plans more closely with justice secretary, shabana mahmood, at 7:30am.t wanted to stop the equipment "falling into the hands of terrorist elements". the paper also says israel has acknowledged that some of its troops have moved beyond a un buffer zone on the syrian side of the border but insists it does not intend to march on damascus. and the front page of the guardian features a photo of luigi mangione — the suspect in the death of unitedhealthcare ceo, brian thompson. the paper reports that he jostled with police and shouted at reporters as he was led into court yesterday. the 26—year—old was there to contest being extradited from pennsylvania to face murder charges in new york. we have something very interesting, fascinating, very special this morning. every year gchq launches its annual christmas challenge aimed at testing our problem—solving skills. it isa it is a proper secret squirrel place and you can never get inside. lintiii and you can never get inside. until now. in a first for british television where a whole programme comes from inside the

overcrowding has recently led to the early release of some prisoners, with justice secretary shabana mahmoodlaming the last government for leaving our prisons in crisis. meanwhile, shadow justice secretary robert jenrick told gb news this morning that labour are not dealing with the heart of the problem, despite all the fanfare in labour's announcement today, there is not any money for new prisons. >> the labour party are admitting that there's going to be a massive shortfall in prison places in the years ahead, and they're not dealing with the heart of this problem. >> hundreds of farmers are descending on westminster with their tractors today, as the government insists its support for the sector is steadfast. last month, over 13,000 people rallied against the changes to inheritance tax. today, farmers are warning the proposed changes could kill british farming. the demonstration is scheduled to coincide with both pmqs and the meeting of mps to discuss the impact of inheritance tax on farmers. but despite the protests, the government says they will not change course on they will not change