A north-east politician has strongly criticised a decision not to transfer young offenders back to a multimillion-pound north-east superjail.
The Ellon wing of HMP Grampian’s remains unoccupied two years after a riot. There have been no moves made to suggest the situation will change anytime soon.
Last night Labour MSP Lewis Macdonald, who has been a vocal critic of how the prison is managed, warned it could be “many years” before the young offenders wing is put to use.
Mr Macdonald, who described the decision as “very flawed”, said that there was “no sign of a schedule being set for movement in the future”.
He added: “Clearly there’s been a lot of public money spent and it’s failed to deliver what it was designed to do – I think that will cause a lot of concern.”
The prison accommodates men, women, as well as young offenders and cost £140million to complete.
HMP Grampian was built to ensure that prisoners could be housed closer to their families.
Mr Macdonald added: “It’s also awful for the families for some of the young people in question whose ability to keep in touch with a young person and hopefully to influence them for the better is greatly limited because instead of being in the north-east as was promised they are still being held elsewhere.”
The riot in which 30 young male offenders were involved took place a mere few weeks after it opened two years ago in May 2014 and the former prisoners are now housed over 150 miles away in Polmont close to Falkirk.
Prison chiefs said that this would allow them to take advantage of new education and support programmes.
A spokesman for the Scottish Prison Service said: “Polmont is currently sitting with about 500 young people in it and it was built for 700.
“The number of young offenders has declined significantly in the past four to five years which has led to a free hall at Polmont.
“We will return them to Grampian when it is deemed the right time to do so.”