Swaleside independent review of progress 2022
Report for Swaleside Prison
Summary
we found that the shortage of officers was worse than at our last inspection leading to very limited time out of cell (see Glossary of terms) for most prisoners. Leaders (see Glossary of terms) were unable to address the issue locally as the Ministry of Justice (MOJ) controlled officer recruitment, and, despite efforts to improve retention at Swaleside, more staff had left than joined over the previous nine months. Steps taken by HMPPS to provide detached duty staff and additional overtime payment were not long-term solutions. Report of an independent review of progress at HMP Swaleside 3 1.5 Leaders did not harness the prison’s strengths effectively to accelerate or sustain progress. Data were not used sufficiently to inform decisionmaking and there was a lack of robust planning to make sure priorities were identified and improvements delivered.