Young Adults in Custody- Yet Another Challenge for Prisons

  

Failings in secure institutions for children are all too familiar, but a report out today paints an equally disturbing picture of life in a prison where many of those serving long sentences are transferred when they turn 18.  

Among the findings of the local watchdog during the course of the year to April, HMP Swinfen Hall saw  

·         “no go” areas for staff too scared to challenge young men in their care

·         uncontrolled meal queues leaving some prisoners with insufficient or no food

·         serious assaults in unlocked cells and unsupervised association rooms and

·         PAVA incapacitant spray deployed more than twice a week    

The Independent Monitoring Board describes the Staffordshire jail as fundamentally unsafe with violence becoming more serious during the year with stabbings and assaults via kicks and stamps to the head. A ban on razors has led to an increase in more dangerous weapons being used. It’s shocking but perhaps not surprising that one young man had isolated himself in his cell for more than three years.

The prison receives young adult men from all over the country, most under 21 with complex needs and presenting high risk of harm. It’s a very challenging cohort but it looks like the prison is simply not equipped to cope with them.  There have been some welcome efforts to identify and support neurodiverse individuals, but every aspect of the prison’s overall effectiveness was undermined by the limited regime on offer.

The main reason is that staffing levels are “pared down to the minimum”, day and night, made worse by staff absence and unfilled vacancies. So staff who are there struggle to manage the basics.

A review of a very serious incident revealed that staff involved did not have all the resources needed to prevent injury in the case of a serious in cell fire. Food trolleys were filthy, waste food was left unbagged all around the prison, faulty kitchen equipment remained out of action for months. Staff culture is such that the chance of prisoners getting any positive feedback or thanks is nigh-on impossible.

It's a dismal read, miles from the direction of travel I set out for places like Swinfen Hall 12 years ago in Young Adults in Custody The Way Forward. The report for the Transition to Adulthood alliance recommended that young adult prisons should be remodelled as Secure Colleges with an integrated programme of education and training at their core, a normalised regime and the possibilities of progression to open conditions.

It’s a model which has been successful in Germany and elsewhere. It requires first and foremost a recognition of the distinctive needs of young adults and a genuine commitment to meet them. I wonder whether there’s the political will for the first let alone the second.