Governors are taking record sick days, figures suggest

The rate of turnover is a "recipe for disaster", campaign group the Prison Reform Trust said.

The trust also said the service was suffering record staff sickness levels.

Prison officers took an average of 17.2 sick days last year.

That was nearly double the target of nine; up from 14 the previous year, and significantly higher than in the police and probation services, where the figure is between 11 and 12 days.

If schools or hospitals had such unstable, inconsistent leadership no-one would put up with it Prison Reform Trust

Between January 1998 and January 2003, 11 prisons had five or more governors. In the same period, 33 had four governors.

"If schools or hospitals had such unstable, inconsistent leadership no-one would put up with it," said PRT director Juliet Lyon.

"Ever-changing governors, severe staff shortages and record levels of prison overcrowding is more like a recipe for disaster than a way of ensuring public safety."

The Prison Governors' Association has said it is best for governors to stay at one jail for between three and five years.

The figures do not include prisons run by the private sector.

The prison population is at record levels of about 72,500 in England and Wales - compared with 44,500 a decade ago and 60,000 when Labour came to power in 1997.

England and Wales now have the highest imprisonment rate in western Europe - 139 prisoners per 100,000 of the population.