HMP Erlestoke – impressive change improving prisoner outcomes
Inspectors returning to HMP Erlestoke were encouraged to find a prison that had made reasonable or good progress against 11 of the 13 recommendations they followed up. The Wiltshire jail was last inspected in 2021, when violence and self-harm levels were rising, staff-prisoner relationships were poor, and living conditions were inadequate.
Commenting on the findings of this independent review of progress, Charlie Taylor, Chief Inspector of Prisons, said:
“After a few years when Erlestoke had not been moving in the right direction, it was encouraging to see that it was now doing so across most areas.”
Leaders at Erlestoke had worked hard to examine and counter the sources of violence, especially debt, although the flow of drugs and alcohol into the prison had not been addressed sufficiently and was still causing problems, with an increased level of prisoner-on-prisoner assaults. Behaviour management programmes, such as challenge, support and intervention plans, were being used more effectively.
Improvements had also been made in supporting prisoners at risk of suicide or self-harm. A newly appointed head of safety had driven forward advances in the quality of the assessment, care in custody, and teamwork (ACCT) process for this group of prisoners.
The jail was generally much cleaner than in previous inspections, and a ‘clean and decent’ lead manager had been appointed to improve oversight. A new regime meant prisoners were able to spend more time out of their cell and more were engaged in constructive activity.
The improvements were in many cases recent, and resulted, in part, from new managers and newly funded roles. There is no reason why these improvements should not become embedded, if the resourcing in key areas and the leadership momentum can be sustained.
Notes to editors
- Read the HMP Erlestoke independent review of progress, published on 5 July 2022.
- HM Inspectorate of Prisons is an independent inspectorate, inspecting places of detention to report on conditions and treatment and promote positive outcomes for those detained and the public.
- HMP Erlestoke was built on the former grounds of Erlestoke manor house. The site was taken over by the then Prison Commissioners in 1960 for use as a detention centre. In 1977 it became a young prisoners’ centre and was converted to a category C adult male training prison in 1988. Life-sentenced prisoners were first received in the 1990s. Since 2018, it has held closed young offenders and adult category C males.
- Independent Reviews of Progress (IRPs) began in April 2019. They were developed because Ministers wanted an independent assessment of how far prisons had implemented HM Inspectorate of Prisons’ recommendations following particularly concerning prison inspections. IRPs are not inspections and do not result in new judgements against our healthy prison tests. Rather they judge progress being made against the key recommendations made at the previous inspection. The visits are announced and happen eight to 12 months after the original inspection. They last two and a half days and involve a comparatively small team. Reports are published within 25 working days of the end of the visit. We conduct 15 to 20 IRPs each year. HM Chief Inspector of Prisons selects sites for IRPs based on previous healthy prison test assessments and a range of other factors.
- At this Erlestoke IRP we followed up 13 of the recommendations from our recent inspection and Ofsted followed up three themes. HM Inspectorate of Prisons judged that there was good progress in four recommendations, reasonable progress in seven, and insufficient progress in two. Ofsted found reasonable progress in all three themes.
- A report on the most recent full inspection of HMP Erlestoke is available on our website, as is the accompanying media release.
- This IRP visit at HMP Erlestoke took place between 24 and 26 May 2022.
- Please contact media@hmiprisons.gov.uk if you would like more information.