A prison pledging scheme should sort this problem out.

just turn all prisoners into monks

hard to see the difference these days anyway

So it's possible to sell an old prison for as much or more than it would take to build a brand new one? Maybe I guess; if the old one is on land with a lot of redevelopment value and the new one would be built on some relatively cheap, unwanted piece of land somewhere. Call me a skeptic, but why is it that this just sounds like another bundle of schemes to put money in some politician's pocket...

Robby nz, on 08 Jul 2013 - 19:01, said:

Between the selling of the old prisons and the building of the new ones where are the inmates going be held?

In the old prison. The contract with the person who buys the old prison says he can't have it until the new prison is built. It's pretty standard procedure.

Or you build one new one first, then close one, build one.

I have never bought or sold a prison so I cant comment on what would be in the contract.

However the idea if I understand the OP correctly was to sell the old prisons to get money to build new ones.

That would appear to indicate they don't have the money to build a new one first.

It would depend just where an old prison was as to whether its sale would bring in enough to finance a new one in a cheaper location.

If they don't have money they can get a bridging loan. This happens all the time in the building industry. You don't need to have sold any prisons to have an understanding of contracts. Just use common sense.