How many men are in prison?

6 December 2023

During today's Prime Minister’s Questions, Conservative MP Nick Fletcher said 90,000 men are waking up in prison every day. 

Prisons are devolved, so the UK government is only responsible for overseeing them in England and Wales. However since we first published this post Mr Fletcher has told us the figure he used referred to the number of prisoners across the whole of the United Kingdom, and this appears to be broadly correct.

As of 1 December 2023, Ministry of Justice figures show there were 84,279 men being held in the prison estate in England and Wales. In addition to that there were 3,612 women, bringing the total to 87,891. This is a substantial rise on the total population of 82,896 12 months ago.

We don’t have precisely comparable figures for Scotland and Northern Ireland, but those we have been able to find suggest the total male UK prison population may be somewhere between 93,000 and 94,000. As of 24 November 2023, there were 7,654 men in prison in Scotland, while the average daily male prison population in Northern Ireland in 2022/23 was 1,607. 

Update 4pm 8 December: We’ve updated this post after receiving a reply from Mr Fletcher and thank him for clarifying his comments.

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