France’s prison system was disrupted on April 27 as guards blockaded facilities across the country in protest at chronic overcrowding and staff shortages.
The action, called by the UFAP-UNSA union, saw 14 of the 17 prisons in the Hauts-de-France region shut down. Demonstrations also took place at sites including Bois-d’Arcy near Paris, Lyon-Corbas, and Villeneuve-lès-Maguelone in the south, in some cases preventing prisoner transfers.
The union is calling for emergency measures to fill an estimated 5,000 vacant guard posts.
France’s prison population stood at 88,419 inmates as of April 1—nearly 25,000 above the system’s capacity of just under 63,500 places. Numbers are rising by around 200 inmates a week, and union officials have warned the total could exceed 90,000 by September.
Justice Minister Gérald Darmanin has rejected proposals for an automatic population regulation mechanism, under which new detentions would trigger corresponding releases once capacity thresholds are reached. Instead, he has argued for legally binding capacity targets.
The government is also advancing the SURE bill, which has passed the Senate and includes a ban on the use of floor mattresses in prisons, though no date has been set for its examination by the National Assembly.
Alongside this, the justice ministry plans to create 3,000 additional prison places—half by 2027—while Darmanin has pushed to accelerate the expulsion of foreign nationals, who account for roughly a quarter of the prison population.
