More is being spent feeding prisoners than sick patients

The Sunday Post has learned prison bosses fork out an average of £2.41 a day for inmates’ food, although the budget in some jails is higher.

Their outlay on prisoner meals has spiralled by almost a fifth in the past three years.

It has emerged some hospitals spend considerably less than that with patients in one area being fed for as little as £1.94 a day.

Campaigners last night slammed the disparity.

Margaret Watt, of Scotland Patients Association, said: “It’s shocking to think prisoners are enjoying such lavish food compared to our sick patients people who really need a good diet.

“The spend on patients is baffling when you consider the Scottish Government’s new plans for feeding primary school children means they will be spending close to what they do on patients in Ninewells hospital in Dundee.

“How can you feed an adult on the same money it costs to feed a small child? It makes no sense.”

Our probe has discovered cons at Polmont Young Offenders Institution had £2.71 spent on feeding them per day last year the highest of Scotland’s 14 jails.

The biggest spending adult jail was Peterhead, where the amount paid for food per day went up from £1.92 in 2010/11 to £2.68 last year.

Before temporarily closing its doors last month, it was home to violent criminals including Limbs in the Loch fiend William Beggs and serial sex killer Peter Tobin.

Beggs who in 2001 was jailed for at least 20 years for the rape and murder of Kilmarnock teenager Barry Wallace has been a vocal critic of the grub at Peterhead.

The lowest spend on jail food was at Greenock, where bosses paid £2.23 per prisoner per day.

The average cost of providing food in hospitals in the NHS Western Isles area last year was between £1.94 and £2.32 per patient per day.

Meanwhile, NHS Ayrshire & Arran forked out £2.71 per patient per day at Crosshouse Hospital in Kilmarnock.

Robert Oxley, of The Taxpayers’ Alliance, said: “Patients served poor hospital meals will find it difficult to swallow that the cost of catering for some prisoners is nearly double what is spent on them.

“No one expects inmates to serve their time eating gruel, but it’s unfair that taxpayers are funding meals for inmates they can’t afford for themselves.”

A Scottish Prison Service spokeswoman said: “All prisoners’ meals contain suitable nutritional content, and comply with the guidelines of the Food Standards Agency.

“The slight increase in the average cost of feeding a Scottish prisoner per day mirrors the rising costs of living in wider society.”