Jailing costs 'underestimated'

Experts found the true cost of imprisonment for a year could be as high as £49,220 when the price of supporting the offender's family was taken into account.

It compared with an existing estimate of £37,500 a year for the cost of the "bars and walls" of the jail itself.

The study by the Centre for Crime and Justice Studies (CCJS) and the Institute of Psychiatry at King's College London concluded prisoners' families were "hidden innocent victims" who experienced significant impoverishment.

The extra cost of sending someone to jail could include NHS bills for treating the offender's relatives - for example, with depression counselling.

Other expenses could include foster care for children and even a home help to assist with household chores.

"The costs of imprisonment are conventionally arrived at by estimating how much is spent to secure and maintain the prisoner," said the study.

"One estimate suggests that sending one person to prison for one year costs £37,500. Our estimates suggest that these costs are too narrow and that additional costs to individual families and the public purse be considered."

The calculations were based on examining five families who had relatives in jail. Their sentences ranged between six months and eight years, and two of the families were Afro-Caribbean and three were white.

One of the families cost the NHS £10,854 and required a "long-term social services intervention" costing £9,724. Two of these family members needed NHS treatment, including one as an in-patient.