THE Tory legacy of chaos in England’s prisons has been further exposed in a damning report condemning “catastrophic” conditions at Wandsworth prison in London.

Suicides, violence, chronic overcrowding, understaffing, rodent infestation and widespread drug use are just some of the problems detailed in a report by HM Inspectorate of Prisons published today.

In May, Chief Inspector of Prisons Charlie Taylor wrote to then Conservative justice secretary Alex Chalk invoking an “urgent notification” demanding action.

But the problem has now been inherited by Labour’s Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood.

Mr Taylor said: “The level of chaos we found at Wandsworth was deeply shocking. The prison population crisis has undoubtedly compounded the pressures on the jail.

“But the appalling conditions at Wandsworth did not appear overnight and are the result of sustained decline permitted to happen in plain view of leaders in the jail, HM Prisons and Probation Service and the Ministry of Justice whose own systems clearly identified the prison as struggling.”

The prison is designed to hold 979 prisoners but instead holds more than 1,500.

Howard League for Penal Reform chief executive Andrea Coomber said that since the inspectorate was founded more than 80 years ago, “it is hard to remember a report as scathing, emphatic and utterly devastating as today’s appraisal of the chaos in Wandsworth.”

Prison Reform Trust chief executive Pia Sinha warned that the new Labour government “has inherited a prison system which is rapidly running out of effective options to respond” and that “an anticipated influx of far-right rioters” would add to the problems.

The Ministry for Justice was invited to comment.