A new report entitled ‘The Cost of Tackling Drugs Harms in Prison’, published by the National Audit Office (NAO), shows that prison and health services are struggling to battle rapidly changing drug threats.
In 2024-25, HMPPS reported 26,348 drug find incidents – 25% more than the previous twelve months. Simultaneously, the proportion of adult male prisoners reporting that it was easy to obtain illicit drugs in prison increased from 24% in 2021-22 to 39% in 2024-25.
The report specifically mentions two rapidly developing threats:
- Increases in the availability of novel substances – such as synthetic opioids which are more potent in smaller quantities than traditional drugs, harder to detect and easier to convey into prisons.
- Increasing use of drones to convey drugs into prisons, with drone sightings increasing by more than 750% between 2019 and 2023 and by 43% between 2023-24 and 2024-25.
The report also states that HMPPS has significantly underspent on two, recent investment programmes aiming to reduce drug harms in prisons. NHS England (NHSE) spending on mental health and substance misuse treatment in prisons in England was also lower in real terms in 2024-25 than it was in 2020-21.
The report found that though HMPPS had sought to reduce the quantity of drugs getting into prisons, it had ultimately been too slow in responding to urgent threats.
The report makes five recommendations:
- HMPPS should respond with more urgency to identified security weaknesses at specific prisons
- HMPPS and NHSE require better information on prevalence and need to prioritise funding
- Commissioners need better health needs assessments with a focus on substance use and standardised formulae to benchmark the cost of services and better KPIs
- Closer partnership arrangements which support better alignment of incentives to shared goals on health-related interventions
- HMPPS and NHS to draw on robust evaluation to understand what works and encourage best practice.
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