ALMOST 61,000 prisoners were locked in police cells last year to ease jail overcrowding -a 13-fold increase on 2006.

It costs taxpayers Pounds 385 a night -Pounds 30 more than a Superior King room at The Ritz hotel and Pounds 284 more than a jail.

Shadow police reform minister David Ruffley uncovered the figures. He put the bill for celling prisoners at cop shops since last year at Pounds 17million.

He said: "Police stations are being clogged up and police time wasted. Every single police station had to look after prisoners last year."

A spokesman for PM Gordon Brown said last night new 'Titan' prisons, to hold up to 2,500, were designed to "alleviate the current situation".