Ministers today activated ‘Operation Early Dawn’ as they triggered emergency measures to avoid prison overcrowding as more rioters are sentenced.
The long-standing plan has been implemented in the North of England in the wake of the recent widespread violent disorder across UK towns and cities.
It allows defendants to be held in police cells and not summoned to magistrates’ court until a space in prison is available.
The Ministry of Justice said the plan had been put in place in the North East and Yorkshire; Cumbria and Lancashire; and Manchester, Merseyside and Cheshire.
Since the outbreak of riots after the Southport stabbing attack on 29 July, more than 450 people have appeared in magistrates’ courts in relation to the chaos.
The Prisons Officers’ Association warned the policy would lead to ‘justice delayed’ for some offenders.
Labour blamed the action on inheriting a prisons system ‘in crisis’ from the previous Tory government.
Ministers today activated ‘Operation Early Dawn’ as they triggered emergency measures to avoid prison overcrowding as more rioters are sentenced
Since the outbreak of riots after the Southport stabbing attack on 29 July, more than 450 people have appeared in magistrates’ courts in relation to the chaos
Operation Early Dawn was previously triggered by the Conservative administration in May in a bid to tackle overcrowding in jails.
Since taking office, Labour have also cut the proportion of a sentence inmates must serve behind bars from 50 per cent to 40 per cent.
The temporary move – which does not apply to those convicted of sex offences, terrorism, domestic abuse or some violent offences – is expected to result in 5,500 offenders being released in September and October.
Prisons minister Lord Timpson said: ‘We inherited a justice system in crisis and exposed to shocks.
‘As a result, we have been forced into making difficult but necessary decisions to keep it operating.
‘However, thanks to the hard work of our dedicated staff and partners, we have brought forward additional prison places and now introduced Operation Early Dawn to manage the pressure felt in some parts of the country.’
Deputy Chief Constable Nev Kemp, from the National Police Chiefs’ Council, said: ‘We are working closely with criminal justice system partners to manage demand in the system and ensure that the public are safe.
‘Policing will continue to arrest anyone that they need to in order to keep the public safe, including policing protests and events and ensuring that people are arrested as expected.’
Mark Fairhurst, the national chairman of the Prison Officers’ Association, told BBC Breakfast: ‘It’s justice delayed at the moment, because we’re not clogging up police cells, so they might have to delay some of their operations.
‘When they arrest people they’ve got to make sure they’ve got them a custody space in police custody, because we might have prisoners filling up their cells.
‘Of course, they have got to pay overtime to supervise prisoners.’
But Mr Fairhurst clarified that this would not mean that some people who would normally go to jail would avoid it.
The vice president of the Prison Governors’ Association said he is ‘not sure’ how much Operation Early Dawn will help the prisons crisis.
Mark Icke told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: ‘I’m not sure it does help, today, tomorrow, the next day, because, as was just suggested, we have been lurching from crisis to crisis for some time.
‘Running a prison is an incredibly complex business and so we don’t know which way to turn at the moment.’
He added that short term measures ‘are not ideal’.
‘We have been highlighting this to the previous Government, we’ve highlighted this to the new Government, and we really do want to sit down and have a conversation about what the purpose of prison is moving forward,’ he said.
‘We cannot carry on operating in this kind of environment, it’s just too much pressure.’