Now do this put-the-text-back-together activity.
This is the text (if you need help).
The new government in the UK is having to deal with a serious crisis in its prison system. The new Labour administration made the decision on Friday to release thousands of prisoners before the convicts had finished serving their sentence. Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer attributed the mess in Britain's prisons service to a decade of neglect and underinvestment under the previous Conservative Party, which had been in power for 14 years. The prisoner population is nearly at capacity. Inmates are having to be released early to accommodate newly-sentenced felons. Some will be released having served just 40 per cent of their time. Mr Starmer said the problem was "pretty unforgivable, in my book".
The UK's justice secretary, Shabana Mahmood, warned of a "total breakdown in law and order" if prisons reached capacity. Ms Mahmood said: "Prisons are on the point of collapse". If space ran out, there would be nowhere to put those arrested or newly sentenced. The justice system would be overloaded. Mahmood said there would be "looters running amok, smashing windows, robbing shops and setting neighbourhoods alight". There are currently only 1,451 places available. She blamed former leader Rishi Sunak and prisons ministers for a "dereliction of duty" and for decimating the system. She called them: "The guilty men who put their political careers ahead of the safety and security of our country."
- What did the article say there was a serious crisis in?
- How many prisoners will be released?
- What did Keir Starmer attribute the mess to besides underinvestment?
- How much of their sentence have some to-be-released prisoners served?
- What did Keir Starmer call the problem?
- Who is Shabana Mahmood?
- What did Shabana Mahmood say there was a total breakdown in?
- How many places are currently available in UK prisons?
- What did Ms Mahmood say prisons ministers showed a dereliction of?
- What did Ms Mahmood say prisons ministers prioritize over UK security?
Back to the overcrowded prisons lesson.
