United Kingdom · South-East & East · Hertfordshire
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UK Local prison operated by HM Prison & Probation Service. Listed in the GOV.UK Find a prison directory.
Capacity
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Current population
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Occupancy
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Year opened
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Operational
Figures from official sources · verified 7 Jul 2026 · methodology
Operator
HM Prison & Probation ServicePopulation held
male
Opened
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Region
South-East & East
Security level
Medium
Death-row facility
No
prison by improving the recruitment, retention and capability of his staff. As a result, staff-prisoner relations were good, and inspectors observed many effective officers supporting and managing prisoners serving sentences from The regime had also improved considerably and was now closer to what we freely to and from activities. Unfortunately, the quality of education was poor, suitable for the population. This meant that while there were vacancies in other Leaders were not aware that the quality of teaching was not good enough and least able was poor, with very inadequate teaching or encouragement of Across the jail we saw improvements in the conditions on the wings and essential maintenance. — UK IMB Annual Report (2024) — Safety: 4.1 Reception and induction 4.1.1 Workload The number of receptions has continued to increase during the year. Shortage of cell spaces throughout the country has led to prisoners being moved more frequently to make use of available accommodation. The SDS40 Early Release Scheme8, saw days when The Mount released 35 (Tranche 1 on 10 September) and 42 prisoners (Tranche 2 on 6 October), a mammoth [...] Respect: 5.1 Accommodation, clothing, food Inside, the prison is generally well-maintained and clean and tidy – the gardens team does an excellent job of keeping the prison’s outside areas tidy, which has been commented on by external visitors. It has spacious grounds, with flower beds and lawns, as well as a farms and gardens area, where vegetables and herbs are grown. Outside the prison perimeter, there [...] Purposeful activity: Very little has changed since last year. The contract provider for education is still People Plus and the education department consists of a main block, a small, additional skills centre and various workshops. There are approximately 341 prisoner attending education and in excess of 100 prisoners in activities, attending in the morning and afternoon, representing about 43% of the roll. Courses [...] Preparation for release: In our previous annual report, we noted that staff shortages and excessive workloads hindered the ability of the Offender management unit (OMU) to help prisoners progress toward rehabilitation and release. Staff shortages have largely been resolved in terms of numbers, but workloads remain excessive. Delays in criminal trials have caused category B local prisons to overflow with remand prisoners, [...]
The prison held about 1,000 adult men at the time of the visit, with more than
Format: Prisoner Name & Number, HMP The Mount, HMP The Mount Molyneaux Avenue Bovingdon Hemel Hempstead Hertfordshire HP3 0NZ See map Help us to improve this page. Give us your feedback in this 2-minute survey .. Use Send Money to a Prisoner (GOV.UK) for funds — cash not accepted.
The regime had also improved considerably and was now closer to what we freely to and from activities. Unfortunately, the quality of education was poor, prisoners was working hard to paint cells, replace flooring and complete other informed about any changes to regimes or new opportunities. The governor training and resettlement prison holding around 1,000 prisoners, many the late 1980s, it is a relatively modern prison, with extensive workshop reasonably good, and a slight improvement in rehabilitation and release planning, but no improvement in outcomes for respect and purposeful activity.
essential maintenance. Conditions on the segregation unit continued to be grim Care for more vulnerable prisoners had improved and self-harm levels were lower than in similar prisons. There had however, been five suicides at the jail had to produce handwritten complaints and discrimination incident reporting
Derived signal — not a judgement. How it's calculated
What the score is responding to:
This facility scores 25. The national average across 584 scored United Kingdom facilities is 4 — 21 points above national average.
Same country, matched on type + security level where possible.
The governor had brought greater stability to this large Hertfordshire category C prison by improving the recruitment, retention and capability of his staff. As a result, staff-prisoner relations were good, and inspectors observed many effective officers supporting and managing prisoners serving sentences from just a few months to life imprisonment. The regime had also improved considerably and was now closer to what we would expect in this category of jail, with well-supervised prisoners moving freely to and from activities. Unfortunately, the quality of education was poor, with a failure to assess the needs of prisoners and deliver a curriculum that was suitable for the population. This meant that while there were vacancies in other activities, there were not enough places in English and maths, nor was there provision for the many men who were only spending a few months at the jail. Leaders were not aware that the quality of teaching was not good enough and they struggled to provide accurate attendance figures. Support for the most and least able was poor, with very inadequate teaching or encouragement of reading, while access to Open University courses had been curtailed so that men who had paid tuition fees were in danger of having to repeat a year because they had missed modules. Across the jail we saw improvements in the conditions on the wings and although much of the accommodation was showing its age, a well-led team of prisoners was working hard to paint cells, replace flooring and complete other essential maintenance. Conditions on the segregation unit continued to be grim with a cage-like exercise yard and still no electricity supply in the cells. The staff, however, were capable and prisoners were spending less time than previously on the unit. Care for more vulnerable prisoners had improved and self-harm levels were lower than in similar prisons. There had however, been five suicides at the jail since our 2022 inspection. The well-led incentivised substance-free living wing, in which knowledgeable staff supported the recovery of the many addicts in the jail, was among the best I have seen. A laptop was now supplied to each prisoner and staff used these to keep men informed about any changes to regimes or new opportunities. The governor produced regular vlogs which, with good levels of visibility by him and his senior team, were appreciated by staff and prisoners alike. While applications could be made on laptops, it was disappointing that prisoners had to produce handwritten complaints and discrimination incident reporting forms, leading to lower quality responses and management oversight. The provision for families was also better. The prison had put on lots of day
5.1 Accommodation, clothing, food Inside, the prison is generally well-maintained and clean and tidy – the gardens team does an excellent job of keeping the prison’s outside areas tidy, which has been commented on by external visitors. It has spacious grounds, with flower beds and lawns, as well as a farms and gardens area, where vegetables and herbs are grown. Outside the prison perimeter, there has often been a lot of litter, due to the lack of bins and the fact that no prisoners are authorised to clean outside. A local family cleaned up the car park and surrounding areas because it was so unkempt. A system needs to be put in place to address this, in the Board’s view. There is a continuing programme of repainting cells and common areas in the wings, carried out by trained prisoners from the Clean Rehabilitative Enabling Decent (CRED) team. By contrast, the common areas in the administrative blocks, where prisoners cannot work, are looking shabby. The Board continues to be concerned by the doubling up of single cells. Prisoners in these cells share a forced intimacy without adequate privacy; there is often not even enough space for prisoners to put away their personal possessions. It is not uncommon for Board members to see double cells, even those that are purpose-built, where prisoners have used bedding to create makeshift screens around in-cell toilets (although the prison does re-order and issue proper curtains from time to time). As always, showers on some wings need [...]
4.1 Reception and induction 4.1.1 Workload The number of receptions has continued to increase during the year. Shortage of cell spaces throughout the country has led to prisoners being moved more frequently to make use of available accommodation. The SDS40 Early Release Scheme8, saw days when The Mount released 35 (Tranche 1 on 10 September) and 42 prisoners (Tranche 2 on 6 October), a mammoth task given that the daily average is less than 4 (with a total of 960 releases during the reporting year). However, these releases seemed to be extremely well organised by the prison management and staff. The Board commends all those who were involved in the planning and execution. 4.1.2 Inadequacy of reception space In the view of the Board the reception area space is wholly inadequate for the numbers that pass through in normal circumstances. But is acknowledged that to increase this would call for a major financial outlay, which is unlikely to be available at this time. The property store is also insufficient to house the stored property, which has accumulated over many years, especially given the paper-based documentation, which can make locating specific items extraordinarily difficult. With the increased numbers and frequency of movements, the turn round of property is shortened, resulting in men arriving and moving on within only 48 hours in some cases. From our observations, staff are welcoming and follow the required process, including scanning incoming prisoners to prohibit [...]
Very little has changed since last year. The contract provider for education is still People Plus and the education department consists of a main block, a small, additional skills centre and various workshops. There are approximately 341 prisoner attending education and in excess of 100 prisoners in activities, attending in the morning and afternoon, representing about 43% of the roll. Courses consist of English, Maths, IT, art and music, as well as a range of other subjects. Most courses are accredited and certificated. Education scored badly in the Ofsted section of the report of the inspection carried out by HM Chief Inspector of Prisons in November 2024 and is being monitored carefully. 7.2.1 Summary Vocational courses in bricklaying, plastering, and carpentry have been delivered throughout the year, with no significant gaps in instructors (although motor vehicles has a vacancy), as has happened in previous years. There was the addition of plumbing, which has been very successful. Planned delivery of Level 2 courses was slow to implement and all accredited courses are delivered at Level 1, which is insufficient for employment needs. Attendance in education was considerably higher by 20% through the reporting period since last year. Prisoners are challenged more regularly for non-attendance, both on the wings and in classes, and the general prison culture moves towards being more employment oriented. There was a marked improvement in punctuality and getting to work and [...]
In our previous annual report, we noted that staff shortages and excessive workloads hindered the ability of the Offender management unit (OMU) to help prisoners progress toward rehabilitation and release. Staff shortages have largely been resolved in terms of numbers, but workloads remain excessive. Delays in criminal trials have caused category B local prisons to overflow with remand prisoners, resulting in category C prisons, such as The Mount, accommodating those who would usually serve their sentence in local prisons. This significantly increases the workload, as processing short-term sentences requires nearly as much effort as long-term ones. This churn has increased as a result of the SDS40 Early Release Scheme, the policy that allows certain prisoners serving certain sentences to be released after serving 40% of their sentence, rather than the previous 50% with staff at The Mount reporting that they have to manage both arrivals and imminent discharges simultaneously. Though prisoner offender managers (POMs) are more visible, some prisoners struggle to arrange meetings due to workload constraints. Nevertheless, the OMU team consistently meets deadlines for recategorisation reviews and parole board hearings. It's also notable that some prisoners commend the support from their POMs when speaking to members of the Board. As noted in the section on complaints (see 5.8.2), there has been a significant increase in COMP1s relation to offender management. We believe that this [...]
1.1 HMP The Mount, near Hemel Hempstead, is a category C adult male training and resettlement prison holding around 1,000 prisoners, many of whom are serving long sentences for serious offences. Opened in the late 1980s, it is a relatively modern prison, with extensive workshop facilities. 1.2 At our previous inspections of HMP The Mount in 2018 and 2022, we made the following judgements about outcomes for prisoners. Figure 1: HMP The Mount healthy prison outcomes in 2018 and 2022 Good Reasonably good Not sufficiently good Poor 1.3 At the last full inspection, in March 2022, we reported on improvements in safety, which was now reasonably good, and a slight improvement in
At our last inspection in 2018 of The Mount, a category C prison near Hemel Hempstead, we found a prison that was deteriorating to the extent that in every healthy prison test the establishment was judged poor or not sufficiently good. The prison held about 1,000 adult men at the time of the visit, with more than two-fifths assessed as either high or very high risk of harm to others. At this inspection, we found an improvement in the test of safety, which was now reasonably good, and a slight improvement in rehabilitation and release planning, but no improvement in outcomes for respect and purposeful activity. The senior leadership team had an appropriate vision that included improving
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World Prisons. (2026). HMP The Mount. Retrieved July 21, 2026, from https://worldprisons.com/prisons/hmp-the-mount
"HMP The Mount." World Prisons. Accessed July 21, 2026. https://worldprisons.com/prisons/hmp-the-mount.
@misc{worldprisons-hmp-the-mount,
author = {{World Prisons}},
title = {HMP The Mount},
year = {2026},
url = {https://worldprisons.com/prisons/hmp-the-mount},
urldate = {2026-07-21}
}