Chris Philp shut down over lack of prison places under the Tories in fiery GB News grilling: 'You had 14 years!'

The Shadow Home Secretary urged Labour to deport 'all foreign criminals' in order to free up spaces

Chris Philp has been shut down in a fiery GB News grilling as he claimed the Tories boosted prison places by 14,000.

Discussing Labour's prison crisis, the Shadow Home Secretary told host Camilla Tominey that the Tories had warned the Government "time and time again" of the consequences of their early release scheme.

Responding to the blame laid on the Tories by Labour over a lack of prison places, Mr Philp told GB News: "The last Government did build 14,000 more prison places, and look, this Government has now been in power for over two years, so frankly, they need to take responsibility for the situation themselves.

"When this law went through Parliament, we Conservatives warned time and time again that the Labour Government's proposals would result in rapists being let out early, in grooming gang perpetrators being let out early, but they ignored us."

Challenging Mr Philp, Camilla argued that the actual number of prison places built by the Tories was just 400 net, not 14,000.

She said: "I'm not sure that stands up to scrutiny, Chris Philp. I think net, between 2010 and 2024, 500 new prison places were added. Net."

The Shadow Home Secretary responded: "Yeah, because some of the old Victorian prisons were decommissioned, but 14,000 were built."

Camilla hit back: "14,000 is a dishonest figure isn't it? If you're talking about net it's 500, it's not enough."

Mr Philp then recalled the crime levels reduced by the Tories, telling Camilla that the last Tory Government "reduced crime by about 50 per cent".

Camilla interjected the Tory MP, arguing: "Well you'd have to because unfortunately, you also reduced the number of prison officers on the front line by 7,000, so thank goodness you reduced crime!

"Between 2010 and 2015, 7,000 frontline prison officer posts were cut in England and England and Wales, and the prison service was slashed by 21 per cent."

Asked by Camilla why the Tories "did not release foreign criminals back to their own countries", Mr Philp argued that "lots" were removed from the UK, but the ECHR was a huge barrier in not deporting more.

He said: "Lots of foreign national offenders obviously were deported, but not enough, I agree. I think they should all be deported.

"I think every single foreign criminal should be deported, both the ones in prison and the ones outside prison."

Camilla hit back: "You say that now, you had 14 years to do it!"

Mr Philp responded: "Let me explain what are the barriers are. The ECHR, the European Convention on Human Rights, they make modern slavery claims, they make asylum claims.

"We're under new leadership. Kemi wasn't the Prime Minister before, I wasn't the Home Secretary, and the position we now have under new leadership is that we're going to leave the ECHR and we would prevent foreign criminals from making modern slavery or asylum claims so we can deport all of them.

"And that will free up prison places and it will also protect the British public."

Mr Philp criticised the Labour Government's early release scheme, urging Mr Burnham to block "rapists and paedophiles" from being released in September.

He concluded: "The Labour Government is completely wrong to let out rapists early, and we warned about this. We opposed this in Parliament. The Labour Government ignored us and now they're in this awful mess.

"And this scheme, by the way, starts on the 2nd of September, and Parliament, I think, comes back that day or the day before that. The Government have pretty much no time to change the law."