What contingency plans it has to avoid routine refusal of new admissions to custody due to overcrowding in the prison estate.

The health, safety, and wellbeing of everyone who lives and works in Scotland’s prisons is a priority for this government and the Scottish Prison Service.We have taken a range of actions in relation to the rising and increasingly complex prison population. This includes the Prisoners (Early Release) Scotland Act 2025 which changed the automatic early release point for most short term prisoners from 50% point of their sentence to 40% (with exclusions for those serving sentences for domestic abuse/sexual offences) and regulations to widen the use of home detention curfew.The Scottish Prison Service is maximising the use of space available within its estate supported by a 10% increase their resource budget, bringing this to £481.5 million in 2025-26. We have also increased community justice funding by £25m over two years, bringing the total funding to £159m in 2025-26.We will continue to progress a range of actions with justice partners to support a sustainable reduction in the prison population.