The Scottish Prison Service (SPS) made a record number of compensation payments to prisoners last year, new figures show. In the financial year 2025/26, 168 payouts were made to inmates, the highest figure in five years and up from 148 the previous year.
The figures, released under Freedom of Information, show the service paid out a total of £308,229 in damages to prisoners over the last five years. The damages are believed to include actions for breaches of human rights, as well as claims over cell or prison conditions, medical treatment, and loss or damage to prisoners' property. Prisoners have also made successful claims for injuries at the hands of other inmates, prison staff, or in accidents.
Taxpayer-funded payouts
Scottish Labour justice spokesperson Pauline McNeill said: “This is a significant amount of money, funded by taxpayers, to cover the cost of these compensation claims.
“Hardworking staff are being pushed to their limits and conditions in prisons are not what they should be, particularly with an ageing estate.
“Given the severe overcrowding in Scotland’s prisons and the impact this has on living conditions, it is inevitable that compensation claims will continue to rise unless ministers take urgent action to address the crisis.”
Scottish Conservative justice spokesman Stephen Kerr MSP said: “People who break the law must face the full consequences for their actions, instead of being handed compensation cheques at taxpayers’ expense.
“It is completely unacceptable that Scotland’s prison system has been allowed to deteriorate to the point where overcrowding and poor conditions are causing harm and contributing to costly legal claims.
“The Scottish Government has failed to get a grip on our prisons and now must expand the prison estate and end their dangerous early release scheme which endangers victims.
“Ministers need to stop making excuses, properly resource the prison service and restore order to a system that is under serious strain.”
Details of claims
The highest total compensation payout to prisoners was £119,349 in 2024/25, while £85,318 of taxpayers' money was forked out last year. A total of 768 damages payments have been made since 2021/22, an average of around £400 per claim.
Individual payouts are also believed to include compensation for a damaged suit, trainers, headphones, and on one occasion £21 to replace a birth certificate.
One of the most recent claimants was Craig McInally, who was awarded £1,000 at the Court of Session in March this year. The SPS were also ordered to pay his costs. McInally successfully claimed he had not been allowed to take part in the rehabilitation courses necessary for release.
He was previously given an order for lifelong restriction at the High Court in Glasgow in December 2022 after offering to help a vulnerable woman kill herself who he had met on a pro-suicide website. The 31-year-old had pled guilty the previous year to a charge of culpable and reckless conduct to the danger of the woman's life. A lifelong restriction order is reserved for the most serious cases of sexual and violent offending short of murder.
In 2012, “Limbs in the Loch killer” William Beggs was awarded £4,800 by the European Court of Human Rights because of the length of time that it had taken for his appeals to be heard. Beggs, now 62, was convicted in 2001 of murdering 18-year-old supermarket worker Barry Wallace in Kilmarnock in 2019 and dumping his severed body parts in Loch Lomond. He was sentenced to life and ordered to serve at least 20 years.
At the time, First Minister Alex Salmond described Beggs' compensation payment as “extremely distasteful”.
Official response
A Scottish Prison Service spokesperson said: “Our staff work hard to meet the rights and needs of all people in our care while managing the significant challenges caused by overcrowding.
“Where an individual is entitled to make a claim, and that claim is upheld, an appropriate amount of compensation may be paid.”
A Scottish Government spokesperson said: “We are taking action to address the high prison population, including building two new prisons, maximising capacity across the prison estate and increasing investment in community justice.
“We are grateful to prison officers and staff across the prison estate, who work tirelessly to maintain a safe and supportive environment for those in their care.”
