The number of prisoners in England and Wales reached a new all-time record high today, just two months after Home Secretary John Reid asked judges to send only the most serious offenders to jail.

On Friday March 30 2007 there were a total of 80,303 prisoners being held in jails in England and Wales.

It came on the day after it was announced that responsibility for prisons and probation in England and Wales would be handed over to the new Ministry of Justice (currently the Department for Constitutional Affairs).

Director of the Prison Reform Trust, Juliet Lyon, said:

The government has just announced a new justice ministry to begin work in five weeks.

But today's record population in custody shows that the government doesn't have five weeks left.

If the Government doesn't end needless overcrowding now, the new justice minister may arrive at their desk to find their job is picking up the pieces of the prison system.