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HMP/YOI Swinfen Hall – improved leadership culture and renewed sense of purpose

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HMP/YOI Swinfen Hall, a category C prison for young adult and adult men in Staffordshire, was judged by inspectors revisiting the jail to be benefitting from a clear vision and leadership culture.

Inspectors from HM Inspectorate of Prisons followed up an inspection in July 2021, when they had identified several concerns, including high rates of violence, significant use of force and an increase in the use of PAVA incapacitant spray. There were limited incentives to motivate positive behaviour and prisoners not allocated to an activity were locked in their cell for 22 hours a day with little hope of accessing an education place. Outcomes for prisoners in rehabilitation and release planning had also regressed: too many faced lengthy delays before attending rehabilitative programmes and the coordination of services for those due to be released was weak.

At this follow-up independent review of progress (IRP), inspectors reviewed 10 of the recommendations made in 2021. They found the prison had made good or reasonable progress against four, but there had been insufficient progress in the remaining six. Ofsted, which carried out a monitoring visit at the same time, found that there had been reasonable progress in two of their four recommendations.

However, despite the lack of progress in some areas, there were promising signs. A new governor had taken up post in September 2021 and there had been changes to the senior management team. The governor’s vision for improvement was beginning to filter through the prison.

Senior leaders had communicated the vision to staff and there was some evidence that staff understood and had embraced this vision. The strategy was realistic, and the prison seemed to us to have a renewed sense of purpose and direction.

Charlie Taylor, HM Chief Inspector of Prisons

Dedicated staff were using safety data to guide and drive the improvement. Senior leaders had pursued several key strands of work to reduce violence, including conflict resolution and initiatives to encourage positive behaviour. Impressively, rates of recorded self-harm had declined by over a third since the 2021 inspection and were now lower than in similar prisons. The use of force however, including PAVA, remained a concern. While there had been some improvement in the use of body-worn cameras by staff, oversight of force needed more attention.

More prisoners were now benefitting from contact with staff and the prison needed to continue this drive and improve the quality of the support. Work to improve equality and diversity had been slow but a designated lead had been recently appointed and was making plans to relaunch the diversity agenda throughout the prison. The offender management unit was now adequately resourced and there had been good progress to address the backlog of offending behaviour programmes.

Overall, and despite some shortcomings, this was a promising review, recognising an improved culture and a renewed sense of purpose and progress. The revitalised senior leadership team were taking the prison in the right direction supported by the prison group director. They were realistic about the scale of the tasks ahead and understood that further progress would require sustained effort and determination.

Charlie Taylor, HM Chief Inspector of Prisons

Notes to editors

  1. Read the HMP/YOI Swinfen Hall independent review of progress report, published on 1 April 2022.
  2. 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.
  3. HMP/YOI Swinfen Hall is a category C prison for young adult and adult men aged 18 to 28, mostly serving sentences of over four years. At the time of our visit, it held 598 prisoners, of whom almost half were from black and minority ethnic backgrounds. The prison contains two specialist wings for those with emerging or diagnosed personality disorders.
  4. 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.
  5. At this Swinfen Hall IRP we followed up 10 of the 34 recommendations from our recent inspection and Ofsted followed up four themes. HM Inspectorate of Prisons judged that there was good progress in two recommendations, reasonable progress in two and insufficient progress in six. Ofsted found reasonable progress in two themes and insufficient progress in two.
  6. This IRP visit at HMP/YOI Swinfen Hall took place between 21 and 23 February 2022.
  7. Please email media@hmiprisons.gov.uk if you would like more information.