REFORM UK have said they will deport prisoners to El Salvador and open pop-up prisons in "very out of the way places" in the UK in a bid to address prison overcrowding.
In a policy which directly mimics the US president Donald Trump, Reform have said they will look to rent prison capacity from the increasingly authoritarian Central American nation amid a capacity crisis in the UK’s estate.
The party has also pledged to open "Nightingale" prison camps on disused government-owned land.
Last year, a report from the Westminster Public Accounts Committee found that the UK prison estate had been operating “at 98.0% to 99.7% occupancy between October 2022 and August 2024” due to “poor planning and delays”.
The Labour Government has faced pressure over its early release scheme, which starts in October in a bid to tackle the overcrowding. Some 5000 people are expected to be released early under sentencing changes.
Reform UK Home Affairs spokesman Zia Yusuf claimed that there “are over 10,000 foreign nationals in British jails”, going on: “We will deport all foreign nationals from our jails.
“If their home countries won’t take them back, we will send them to serve their sentences in countries like El Salvador and Kosovo.
“We will use the space created to ensure that serious criminals stay where they belong. Behind bars.”
Reform UK leader Nigel Farage said he has opened talks with the government of El Salvador on potentially renting prison spaces.
“To house a foreign national offender in El Salvador will be half the cost of housing a foreign national offender in this country, and will give us more prison spaces,” Farage said at a press conference on Monday.
Reform chair Lee Anderson is expected to lead a delegation to El Salvador within months to conduct further feasibility discussions.
The plans echo a US policy in which Donald Trump struck an agreement with El Salvador to deport migrants from the United States.
Farage further said that Reform UK would open pop-up “Nightingale” prisons on Ministry of Defence (MoD) land which is no longer used.
“A lot of these facilities are in very out of the way places,” Farage said.
Temporary “Nightingale” hospitals and courts were introduced during the Covid pandemic to provide additional space for treatment and hearings.
Reform's pledges come after polls from several major firms suggested they were losing their lead over Labour, which they had held for 16 months. One poll, of more than 5000 UK voters, put them in third place, nine points behind Andy Burnham's Labour.
A Labour Party spokesperson said: “Keeping the public safe is and always will be Labour’s first priority. The Government has already made clear we are working at pace to deport foreign criminals and we’re building more prison places to deliver justice for victims and keep criminals behind bars.
“Reform have no serious answers to the Tory prisons crisis and would lead the system to collapse. This would result in a free for all for dangerous and violent offenders, including murderers and rapists.
“Nigel Farage and Reform simply can’t be trusted to keep Britain safe.”
