There is no plan to take formal action against staff members who were responding to an emergency to preserve life.  In emergencies, the first priority of staff is always to safeguard the life and safety of those in their care.

This incident was not a strip search as erroneously reported but the removal of clothing from a child who was using it to create ligatures and self-strangulate. She was placed into anti-ligature clothing to prevent causing further harm to herself.

Following the incident highlighted by H M Inspectorate, a learning review has been conducted by the Youth Custody Service’s Safeguarding Team. It focused on four main themes:

• protecting the well-being of children and staff during and after incidents

• further training and guidance for staff in incident management of girls

• integrated care management to ensure all departments work effectively with a child

• management of resources to ensure there is an appropriate gender balance of staff on night duty.

The Youth Custody Service (YCS) will oversee the action in response to the learning review. This includes the provision of additional support to HMYOI Wetherby in its management of exceptionally complex high-risk, high-harm girls, the development of specific gender-responsive operating guidance, and effective use of available resources to support children.

The YCS has revised the Minimising and Managing Physical Restraint syllabus, which is the behaviour management and restraint system used to provide youth estate staff with the ability to identify behaviour that causes concern and use de-escalation and diversion strategies to minimise the use of restraint through the application of behaviour management techniques. This has been rolled out at HMYOI Wetherby.

Because of the way in which the data are compiled, it is not possible to provide the information in the form requested.

Non-association alerts are used as a means of improving the safeguarding of children and young people in young offender institutions in the public sector youth estate. Such alerts should only be issued after appropriate consideration, and where there is an identified need. Where an alert has been issued, the child or young person is able to mix with other children and young people in their residential units and in education.

A “snapshot” taken on 25 March 2024 shows the following numbers and percentages of children and young people at each young offender institution in the public sector youth estate who were assessed as needing to be kept apart from one or more other children or young people in the establishment owing to safeguarding concerns. The decisions are often made at the request of the child or young person who is the subject of the non-association alert.

HMYOI Cookham Wood:
46 of 58 children (79.3 per cent)

HMYOI Feltham A:
68 of 82 children (82.9 per cent)

HMYOI Werrington:
57 of 68 children (83.8 per cent)

HMYOI Wetherby:
106 of 149 children (71.1 per cent)

These figures are taken from operational oversight data.

HMYOI Parc, which is operated under contract, is not included in these arrangements.

The YOI population has decreased significantly – from 1,998 in the year to 31 March 2010 to 332 in the year to 31 March 2023. The cohort we now have in the YOI sector of the youth estate – overwhelmingly young men – present many complex issues, however 70 per cent were sentenced to custody for a violent offence. Our staff work hard to diffuse conflict and reduce violence, both between prisoners and against members of staff.

No girls under 15 have been placed at HMYOI Wetherby in the last 12 months. We do not expect to make any such placement in the next 12 months.

NHS England has advised that, since the inspection, the waiting time for a routine dental appointment at HM Wetherby Young Offenders Institute (HMYOI) has reduced from 15 weeks to 12 weeks, with all patients triaged to ensure all urgent or pain related cases are expedited appropriately. Orthodontist services are also available.

Healthcare services continue to provide regular weekly dental clinics at HMYOI Wetherby, and non-attendance at appointments has reduced, with the involvement of an allocated healthcare officer. Work is also underway to re-procure dental healthcare services in secure children’s settings, which will further improve access and reduce waits.

Following the previous inspection of HMYOI Wetherby, additional emphasis was placed on resettlement work. This has resulted in improved outcomes for children and young people in our care. HM Inspectorate’s latest report notes that children and 18-year-olds received good support from resettlement practitioners (RPs) and the social workers who worked with them, and Home Detention Curfew (HDC), transitions, parole and early release processes were managed well.

The Head of Resettlement at HMYOI Wetherby will lead improvement in the quality and consistency of risk-assessment work by RPs, by undertaking the following actions:

• senior leaders and first line managers will highlight any knowledge gaps, to share good practice and identify learning for a training needs analysis
• developing and delivering an appropriate catalogue of training in relation to young people over the age of 18 who are transitioning to the adult estate, as well as Prisoner Offender Management training, for all RPs
• improving RP knowledge and understanding of the intervention catalogue, through awareness sessions, delivered quarterly by treatment managers; and
• ensuring resettlement targets are shared with all children via their in-room launchpads, so that they are aware of their objectives, and that objectives are recorded on electronic case notes.

Education managers created a reading strategy which commenced in November 2023 and is in use across the prison, making sure reading for purpose and reading for pleasure are adequately planned and delivered in all lessons, including those for children receiving outreach tuition.

The Head of Education, Skills & Work at HMYOI Wetherby, who is part of the Senior Management Team, will work with the education provider to effect improvements in the quality of English teaching. Attention will be given to ensuring that teachers, when planning learning, pay full regard to children’s starting points, so as to be able to maintain their interest and engagement. All functional skills staff will be required to attend collaborative planning workshops, to improve planning for learning, create clear assessment checkpoints and markers for assessing progress, and develop a sequenced curriculum for delivering English lessons. The Education provider will ensure their staff are teaching to good or outstanding grades through observations of teaching and learning, providing continual professional development and support to any staff who do not reach the required minimum standards. This will be monitored through contract management processes.

His Majesty’s Prison & Probation Service is providing support to the staff at HMYOI Wetherby who care for girls in the Keppel Unit. The Youth Custody Service is looking to develop a gender-specific operating model for HMYOI Wetherby, and gender-responsive guidance for the wider youth secure estate. We will continue to place girls into the Keppel Unit when it best suits their needs.

For the longer term, we are examining future placement options of girls who receive a custodial sentence, together with the operational support and training needed for the care of girls in the youth estate.

The information requested, stated in hours and minutes, is set out in the table below. The figures below were calculated during January 2024.

As the number of girls at HMYOI Wetherby is very small, it would not be statistically appropriate to try to draw conclusions from the above figures about girls’ general experience of time out of room.

We recognise the importance of ensuring that time in a secure setting is purposeful, and we are committed to ensuring that children and young people have the necessary and appropriate access to education, skills, and work related provision with a consistent daily programme of activities supporting their wellbeing and progress. The Youth Custody Service continues to review daily activity and staff deployment to maximise time-out-of-room, with a focus on staff recruitment and retention to support this delivery.

HMYOI Wetherby has put measures in place to improve the timeliness and quality of discrimination complaint responses. A tiered quality-assurance process has been introduced for discrimination incident reporting forms (DIRFs); Equality Advisors and the Head of Equalities will quality-assess all DIRF cases, monitoring the promptness and quality of investigation responses. An escalation process, overseen by the Deputy Governor, is in place for any overdue responses.

In addition, the monthly meetings of the Senior Leadership Team and Equality Action Group will discuss the DIRFs submitted during the previous month, to identify any trends relating to discrimination.

The Youth Custody Service’s COVID-19 Research & Evaluation Programme Report, published in January 2023 (Youth Custody Service YCS CoRE Programme report (publishing.service.gov.uk)) explored the experiences of those involved in the youth secure estate in England and Wales during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic. One of the key findings was that staff were concerned about the effect on children’s well-being of regime restrictions and interruptions to criminal cases. They noted, however, a reduction in self-harm and violence, which they related to children’s feeling safer, as a result of smaller residential groups and a calmer regime.

Overall, our primary strategy to reduce violence within the youth estate is to deliver our framework for integrated care, known as ‘SECURE STAIRS,’ which seeks to support staff in working with children and young people to provide trauma-informed care which addresses the causes of their offending behaviour and sustainable long-term support in preparing them for release. This is delivered in partnership with NHS England, and includes improvements in areas such as conflict resolution and specialist psychological interventions.

The Youth Custody Service Placement Team endeavours to place every child who is sentenced to custody safely, appropriately, and swiftly. Each child’s placement is determined by the Placement Team following a thorough review of all evidence presented by the child’s Youth Offending Team. If all relevant information is available, the decision on placement can be taken quickly, but factors outside the team’s control – for example, if the child’s case is heard towards the end of the court day – can lead to late arrival in custody.

Some placements are at a significant distance from the court, though the effect of this is mitigated, as far as possible, by children being moved direct to the placement location. Additionally, there may be delays in escorting the child to the placement – stoppages caused by road traffic accidents, for example – which can be outside the control of the escort providers. We have robust contract management processes in place to ensure the performance of Prison Service Escort Contractors.

In 2021, the Youth Custody Service and NHS England co-commissioned the Centre for Mental Health to undertake a review into the needs of girls in the children and young people secure estate.

The report found that trauma-related stress is then communicated differently by boys and girls. More often, girls communicated stress through internalising behaviours such as self-harm, and boys through externalising behaviours.

Any girl in the secure estate who is at risk of self-harm will be supported through the Assessment, Care in Custody and Teamwork (ACCT) process, ensuring she has a dedicated case manager, and girls with the most complex needs will receive additional monitoring and more intensive case management.

The Youth Custody Service is confident that HMYOI Wetherby is taking the required steps to improve the conditions of the grounds and facilities at the site.

A new recording process will be put in place to enable the weekly facilities management meeting to take forward improvements in decency and conditions on residential units. The residential heating systems will be reviewed. Necessary repairs have been identified, including the replacement of windows on the Keppel Unit. A new graffiti removal programme will be developed, and the cleaning schedules will be reviewed and extended, to provide additional cleaning of the residential units.

Residential managers will be identified, who can act as decency leads to improve maintenance assurance and ensure escalation of any continuing problems. HMYOI Wetherby is re-introducing weekend room inspections by custodial managers and senior leaders.

Opportunities for paid part-time employment, including cleaning and redecoration, will be created for young people at the young offender institution, together with incentives to instil a sense of pride in, and responsibility for, their own communities.

The Governor or Deputy Governor will meet weekly with AMEY, the facilities management provider, to discuss the delivery and completion of estate maintenance and the annual painting schedule. Progress will also be monitored at the monthly tri-partite meetings between the Governor or Deputy Governor, AMEY and the Regional Health and Safety Advisor.

HM Inspectorate’s report explains that the key reason for differences in length of time out of room, was whether children could mix with other children. The Youth Custody Service (YCS) will aim to reduce the length of time for which children at HMYOI Wetherby are separated, and improve the regime provided for them, by introducing new guidance which will make for a consistent approach to carrying out Rule 49 (Removal from association) reviews. A psychologist will provide timely short-term assessments of risk and need, to support efficient reintegration at the earliest opportunity.

The YCS will seek to ensure that reintegration planning commences at the point of separation, and includes input from all key areas, to ensure the child is provided with a purposeful regime including education, gymnasium, wing-based activities and psychology.

We will improve the education provision for all children, and the charity Kinetic Youth will be involved in enhancing provision for separated children.

In November 2022, to support adult prison capacity challenges, it was decided that children who reach the age of 18 should generally remain in the youth estate until just prior to their 19^th birthday. All placement decisions are taken on a case-by case basis, however, considering both the young person’s needs and the safety and safeguarding of others. Newly-sentenced and remanded 18-year-olds continue to be allocated to adult establishments; there are no plans to change this.

The interim policy has contributed to an increase in the overall youth custody population. We are continuing to monitor the impact of holding 18-year-olds for longer in the youth estate. The level of assaults and use of force incidents as a proportion to the total population of the estate has decreased; rates of self-harm across the population have also decreased.

We are conducting a review to assess the impact of the interim policy in greater detail, and will publish a report later this year.

The dedicated social workers located in HM Young Offender Institutions support staff to meet their safeguarding and looked-after child responsibilities, and facilitate good working relationships between establishments and local authorities. Additionally, the recently revised ‘Working Together to Safeguard Children’ guidance includes direction for local authorities when a child becomes looked-after as a result of being remanded to youth detention accommodation.

The Youth Custody Service (YCS) is developing further guidance on how professionals in establishments and the community should work together to facilitate a looked-after child’s contact with their social worker and how to resolve issues where these arise. This will be available to staff by May 2024. The YCS will also be creating opportunities for staff to come together and share good practice in this area.

The YCS has recently improved processes to collate and analyse data, both on community professionals visiting children in custody, and on the social care status of children and young people in its care. The higher-quality data will help inform future work to improve care for looked-after children.

Work is in progress to improve data quality in the Youth Justice Application Framework and Asset Plus framework, including the looked-after child field.

In emergency situations, the first priority of staff is always to safeguard the life and safety of those in their care. Staff will do all they can to preserve the dignity of a child, consistent with the urgent need to prevent harm.

Following the incident highlighted by HM Inspectorate, a Learning Review has been conducted by the Youth Custody Service’s Safeguarding Team. It made 21 recommendations to ensure that lessons on appropriate practice are learned, both at HMP Wetherby and across the youth secure estate. The recommendations focus on four main themes:

• protecting the well-being of children and staff during and after incidents
• further training and guidance for staff in incident management of girls
• integrated care management to ensure all departments work effectively with a child
• management of resources to ensure there is an appropriate gender balance of staff on night duty.

Force must only ever be used as a last resort, and at the lowest possible level. A policy on use of force in the youth estate (‘Minimising and Managing Physical Restraint’) was published last year. Staff are trained to use the minimum level of force, and the guidance makes clear that pain-inducing techniques should only be used as an exceptional emergency response.

In emergency situations, the first priority of staff is always to safeguard the life and safety of those in their care. Staff will do all they can to preserve the dignity of a child, consistent with the urgent need to prevent harm.

Following the incident highlighted by HM Inspectorate, a Learning Review has been conducted by the Youth Custody Service’s Safeguarding Team. It made 21 recommendations to ensure that lessons on appropriate practice are learned, both at HMP Wetherby and across the youth secure estate. The recommendations focus on four main themes:

• protecting the well-being of children and staff during and after incidents
• further training and guidance for staff in incident management of girls
• integrated care management to ensure all departments work effectively with a child
• management of resources to ensure there is an appropriate gender balance of staff on night duty.

Force must only ever be used as a last resort, and at the lowest possible level. A policy on use of force in the youth estate (‘Minimising and Managing Physical Restraint’) was published last year. Staff are trained to use the minimum level of force, and the guidance makes clear that pain-inducing techniques should only be used as an exceptional emergency response.