'Save £460m by sending foreign prisoners home'

A TORY MP has suggested the government could save £460 million a year by sending back foreign prisoners to serve sentences in their country of origin.

Protesting that Britain had become the "United Nations of crime", Philip Hollobone said it was a "national disgrace" that there were 11,367 foreign nationals serving time in the UK.

"I don't see why the British taxpayer should pay the bill for housing and lodging foreign nationals who have abused our trust by committing crimes so heinous they've been jailed.

"Their own countries of origin should pick up the bill," he added, introducing his Foreign Prisoners (Repatriation) Bill.

Mr Hollobone said a third of all foreign prisoners had been convicted of violent or sexual offences, and a fifth of drug crimes.

The prisoners came from 160 countries but the top five were Jamaica, with 963 prisoners; Nigeria, 752; the Republic of Ireland, 647; Vietnam, 620; and Poland, 617.