More than a thousand inmates will be released early to free up spaces in prisons as part of measures to tackle the overcrowding crisis.
Under the urgent action, offenders serving one to four years who are recalled to prison for breaching their licences, will be released after 28 days.
Justice secretary Shabhana Mahmood said the move would free up about 1,400 prison places and buy ministers time to overhaul a system "on the brink of collapse".
Ms Mahmood said on Wednesday that without action the country will run out of jail places in November as it is currently operating at 99% capacity.
Three new jails are also set to be built but despite “record prison expansion”, Britain will still be over 9,000 prison places short by 2028.
A £4.7 billion package of funding will be made available in the spending review to build three new facilities.
Ms Mahmood said: "Today, I am announcing a measure that will target the recall population, which has more than doubled in seven years.
"We will bring legislation in the coming weeks that means those serving sentences of between one and four years can only be returned to prison for a fixed 28-day period.
"Some offenders will be excluded from this measure, including any offender who has been recalled for committing a serious further offence.
"We also will exclude those who are subject to higher levels of risk management by multiple agencies where the police, prisons and probation services work together."
Asked how many people would be released as a result, she said: "We believe that that number will allow us to get from November into spring of next year, as you will have seen on the slides earlier, we are on track to hit zero capacity within our prison estate by November, and this measure will tide us over until any changes from the sentencing review start to hit the system.
"And look, I understand the concerns of victims groups and others, the very worst thing that could happen is that we hit zero in November, and as Amy and I have both described at that point, you see the breakdown of law and order in this country.
"If we hit zero in November, then police cannot make arrests, courts cannot hold trials, and the whole system then collapses. So we cannot allow that to happen, and it is my job to make sure that that does not happen."
The prison population is rising by 3,000 people every year and there are currently 88,087 men incarcerated.
The Government has come close to activating Operation Early Dawn in recent weeks due to the rising numbers occupying cells.
The emergency measure involves an operational assessment being made each morning and throughout the day by the Prison Service, courts and police on which defendants can be transferred from police cells and taken to courts to ensure there is a safe and secure location if a defendant is remanded to custody.
Interim Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Justice, Amy Rees, said: "If capacity gets even tighter, as an exceptional measure, we would activate Operation Early Dawn.
“This means we convene a team at 5.30am every day to track each individual potentially coming into custody so that we can make sure there will be an available space for them.
"Early dawn was activated between August 19 to September 9 last year prior to the implementation of early releases.
"It was also previously activated in October 2023, March 2024 and May 2024.
"In recent weeks, we have come close to activating Early Dawn once again. If Operation Early Dawn is unable to manage the flow of prisoners, the situation becomes intolerable.
"We would at this stage, see the managed breakdown of the criminal justice system."
Reacting to the fresh measures on Wednesday, shadow justice secretary Robert Jenrick said Labour was "making the problem worse".
He said: "Under Labour's new rules, instead of being recalled to serve the rest of their sentence, they'll be given a fixed-term recall of a pitiful 28 days.
"They are then released, with no reassessment of risk or Parole Board oversight.
"That is not justice. It's a recipe for the breakdown of law and order.
"By telling prisoners that they will never serve their full sentence, even if they reoffend, the Justice Secretary has removed an important deterrent."
The emergency announcement comes ahead of the independent sentencing review, led by former justice secretary David Gauke, which has been looking at tougher punishments outside of prison as part of Government efforts to tackle jail overcrowding.
The recommendations for reform are expected to be published in the coming weeks.
Chief executive of charity Howard League for Penal Reform, Andrea Coomber KC, said the recall change was a "logical step to take" when the recall population is rising so quickly, and said the upcoming sentencing review is a chance for "a lasting solution to this mess".
"There is no time to lose, and only bold reform will do," she said.
Meanwhile, the chairman of the Prison Officers Association (POA) said building new prisons will "not improve the current population crisis".
"The Government would be better off spending billions of taxpayers' money on modernising the prison estate, funding an under-resourced probation service, providing more secure mental health beds and ensuring we have robust community sentences that the public have confidence in," Mark Fairhurst said.
