Cookham Wood independent review of progress 2022
Report for Cookham Wood Prison
Summary
we found that outcomes had declined in the key area of purposeful activity and were poor, our lowest judgement. Outcomes for children were not sufficiently good in our three other healthy prison tests. The key issue was that staff did not challenge poor standards on residential units and had low expectations of children. Consequently, many children were not motivated to use their time at Cookham Wood usefully. 1.4 At this visit we reviewed progress against 14 key recommendations, including four identified by Ofsted. During the winter months, Cookham Wood had been a COVID-19 outbreak site and had experienced staff shortfalls as a result. This had affected the ability of leaders and managers to make swift progress towards addressing our recommendations. Taken as a whole, progress had been reasonable or better in seven of the 14 areas that we reviewed. In most areas where progress was not good enough, this was because there had not been enough time to assess the impact of very recent changes. 1.5 Cookham Wood has had longstanding weaknesses in ensuring consistent standards of cleanliness, care and behaviour management. Leaders had secured funding for a refurbishment programme for Report of an independent review of progress at HMYOI Cookham Wood 3 residential units and, where this was complete, living conditions were much improved. In the weeks before our visit, the governor had increased the number of custodial managers on residential units to provide support for frontline staff and improve consistency.