HMP Standford Hill

Gallery

From Wikimedia Commons (CC-BY-SA where not otherwise stated).

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  Photo by Terryjoyce via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)

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  Photo by Thomas Nugent via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 2.0)

Reports

• HMIP20 Oct 2024

  Standford Hill, an open prison for adult men on the Isle of Sheppey in Kent, is situated next to HMP Swaleside and HMP Elmley and has room for up to 464 men. The early release schemes, introduced by the Ministry of Justice in late 2024 to manage the prison population crisis, had a marked impact on the number of men held. On one single day, for example, the population had fallen by 75. We last inspected Standford Hill in 2019, when outcomes in three of our healthy prison tests – safety, purposeful activity, and preparation for release – were good, and outcomes in respect were reasonably good. As an excellent inspection back then, it was pleasing to see, that despite the challenges of recent years, the governor and his team had maintained that level of performance as well as addressing nearly all the concerns and recommendations we raised five years ago. Standford Hill is a very safe prison. Prisoners were inducted well into the jail and received help to settle in and make a good start. Self-harm and violence were rare and all other safety outcome indicators were low or compared favourably with findings at similar establishments. Prisoners were motivated and incentivised by the quality of life at the prison, the clear opportunities for progression, and in particular, the employment and resettlement opportunities release on temporary licence could provide. The positive staff-prisoner relationships we saw, as well as the new modular accommodation that made up C wing, were similarly important contributors to this incentivising culture. The exception to this was the disappointing standards in some of the communal areas of the older accommodation. In our survey, most prisoners told us that their experiences at Standford Hill would make them less likely to reoffend. The meaningful regime meant the prison had a tangible sense of purpose, with education (some of which had been enhanced further by an additional partnership with a local college), work within the prison, and a very significant offer in terms of employment in the community available. Our partners in Ofsted assessed provision as ‘good’ against all their assessments. Work to support offender management, risk of harm reduction and public protection were similarly very good, as was the support offered to help prisoners maintain good family ties. The prison was well-led, innovative and creative, with a relatively small criticism being that some prisoners were perhaps not quite as aware of what was on offer as they could have been. Leaders, in particular the governor, were visible, approachable, and enthusiastic yet realistic about what could be achieved at Standford Hill. We hope that the impressive work continues and that the few priorities we identified can further improve outcomes for prisoners housed here. Charlie Taylor HM Chief Inspector of Prisons November 2024

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• NPM-uk-imb-respect1 Jan 2024

  5.1 Accommodation, clothing, food Background C wing consists of a group of 80 pods, which have ensuite facilities. This accommodation is more modern and attractive and most of the prisoners who are accommodated here work outside the prison, many of them at night. To be eligible to occupy a pod prisoners must meet the following criteria: • they have less than two years remaining on their sentence • they are in regular employment • they have no negative adjudications (a disciplinary hearing to establish if a prisoner has broken prison rules) The other pods are occupied by orderlies, trusted prisoners who help to provide services that contribute to the running of the prison Accommodation We do not often receive complaints about the accommodation at Standford Hill despite the fact that it is relatively old. We believe that this is primarily because prisoners have their own individual rooms. These rooms do not contain washing or toilet facilities, nor is there an any form of telephony in the individual rooms. Some prisoners who reach Standford Hill after being at more modern prisons do feel that the accommodation compares unfavourably with other prisons they have been confined in, but this is generally offset by the setting of the prison. Some brightening up of the wings has been undertaken by the art class and this has improved the environment noticeably. The introduction of the pods has been a positive step in the modernisation of the prison, replacing as it did the crumbling [...]

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• NPM-uk-imb-safety1 Jan 2024

  4.1 Reception and induction The reception area is just adequate for the ongoing transfer of prisoners in and out of the prison. This year it has been very busy with the ongoing early release schemes and the TPRS. During the year the number of receptions has rapidly increased. Trying to maintain capacity has been difficult at times due in part to the transfer of prisoners between prisons and the lack of transport to and from Standford Hill. This needs to be addressed across the prison service if Standford Hill is to maintain numbers at or near capacity. The storage area in reception continues to have problems. A new storage area is still awaited when the prison expansion project is undertaken. The induction process continues with two mandatory sessions per week. Here prisoners get their induction “passport” stamped, this enables them to progress to RoTL, education or employment 4.2 Suicide and self-harm, deaths in custody In the period under review there were two deaths in custody, one suspected self- inflicted death and one from natural causes. The prison continues to identify those prisoners with problems that may cause them to feel the need to harm themselves. Mental health support is greatly enhanced with the ongoing neurodiversity lead and assistance of healthcare. Prisoners who have issues are identified and supported through the – safety intervention meeting (SIM) 4.3 Violence and violence reduction, self-isolation The reducing reoffending strategy focuses on the [...]

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• NPM-uk-imb-purposeful-activity1 Jan 2024

  Education results at Standford Hill in the year 2024-2025 are good and high standards from previous years have been maintained. This was confirmed by the reports from HM Inspectorate of Prisons and Ofsted, who visited in late 2024. The percentage of students achieving pass marks in examinations for the core subjects for the year were as shown in the chart below and show positive improvements compared with a year ago. 2023-2024 2024-2025 English 91% 94% Mathematics 87% 89.5% Health & safety and first aid 97% 99.5% As commented in last year’s report, this level of achievement is regarded as normal at Standford Hill and continues to be maintained, although Ofsted’s comments on figures for the early part of the year resulted in a strong effort by the prison during the last quarter to raise the outcomes resulting in the overall improvements shown above. Indeed, Standford Hill rose to third in the national tables for the last quarter. The only problem noted is that there is some difficulty in ensuring that attendance is as high as hoped for. In the open environment there are many essential calls on student time, particularly in the early part of their stay here. They have to attend sessions in, for example, with the OMU to ensure that all the necessary checks are made on their progress in preparation for their release, and that prisoners are keen to get paid jobs. Although the Board has noted that some appointments may clash, prisoners are expected to manage these conflicts [...]

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• NPM-uk-imb-preparation-for-release1 Jan 2024

  The offender management unit (OMU) is responsible for the sentence management of prisoners. They calculate the length of sentence remaining on transfer to the prison to ensure that prisoners serve their appropriate sentence. In addition, they are responsible for the clearance of prisoners to leave the prison on a regular basis as part of life in an open prison. The OMU ensure that all prisoners leaving the prison on resettlement overnight release (ROR) and release on temporary licence (ROTL) are thoroughly checked to ensure that all partners are happy with that release and that issues like exclusion 19 zones are fully considered. For prisoners to leave the prison for work they have to be similarly checked. This is an issue of concern for many prisoners and the OMU hold regular drop-in sessions so that issues may be raised. During the year under review the OMU have been under exceptional strain due to the early release schemes. Large numbers were released in October 2024, and consequently the prison was substantially under-utilised. This caused substantial extra work for OMU, and they are to be congratulated for the fact that no substantial issues or delays occurred. This continued and over 80 prisoners were released in June 2025, and this required planning well before release. We have noted elsewhere that in the year under review the prison was significantly under-utilised for several months. Also, the nature of the prisoners now being sent and the short periods for which [...]

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• HMIP2 Sept 2019

  Full inspection of HMP/YOI Standford Hill (2019-09-02)

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