Edinburgh's Saughton prison spends £1 million on overtime payments to prison officers

Edinburgh's Saughton jail paid out almost £1m for overtime by prison officers last year.

Almost £1 million was spent on overtime payments to prison officers at Edinburgh's Saughton jail last year - more than double the amount for the previous year.

It means HMP Edinburgh has the second highest overtime bill out of all Scotland's prisons in 2022/23. Only Glasgow's Barlinnie jail paid more - £1,059,303 compared to Saughton's £973,802. The total overtime bill for prison officers across the country was £6,156,670.

Over the past five years, prison officers at Saughton have been paid £3.36 million for overtime. The figures were obtained by justice and social affairs magazine 1919, using Freedom of Information legislation.

Last year, the population across Scotland’s prisons topped 8,000 for the first time in a decade.

Lothian Tory MSP Miles Briggs said the increasing overtime bill was evidence of underfunding by the Scottish Government.

He said: “The prison service is fortunate to have staff who are prepared to work extra hours with such regularity. But clearly it points to a problem if there are so many gaps in the rota.

“The SNP government has under-funded and under-valued the justice system for so long, and this is another symptom of that. If the Scottish Prison Service is to do its job properly, it needs to be properly resourced in order to keep prison officers safe and ensure the proper rehabilitation of inmates.

“People across the Lothians will be concerned to see that overtime is such a critical part of the running of HMP Edinburgh.”

A Scottish Government spokesperson said: “Prison officer pay arrangements are an operational matter for the Scottish Prison Service. Despite an Autumn Statement that Ministers have made clear was devastating for Scottish finances, we are increasing investment in our vital prison service by increasing the SPS resource budget by 10 per cent to £38.5 million.

“£167 million capital funding will be invested in the prison estate to allow SPS to progress the construction of HMP Highland and HMP Glasgow. We will continue to take action in relation to the high and increasingly complex prison population. The additional funding for SPS is a crucial component of that, enabling them to continue to provide a safe and secure prison system.”