The prison was given a full inspection in July 2022, the full report can be read on the HM Inspectorate of Prisons website, just follow the links below. In their latest report the inspectors said:
HMP Channings Wood is a category C training and resettlement prison for adult men near Newton Abbot, Devon, run by HM Prison and Probation Service, holding 662 prisoners against a certified normal accommodation of 710. Inspectors rated safety, respect and rehabilitation and release planning all Reasonably Good, an improvement on the previous inspection when all four healthy prison tests were rated Not Sufficiently Good, while purposeful activity remained Not Sufficiently Good.
The proportion of prisoners reporting they felt unsafe fell markedly, from a third to around one in six, and most said staff treated them with respect, well above the average for similar prisons. Reported drug availability also fell sharply. Inspectors welcomed newly installed in-cell telephones supporting family contact, a well-used library with reader-development work, the Outside the Box programme for prisoners with personality disorders or neurodivergent needs, and the Storybook Dads scheme letting fathers record messages for their children. The Chief Inspector credited leaders with a credible pandemic recovery plan and clear ambition.
Six priority concerns were identified nonetheless. Vulnerable new arrivals were sometimes held in unsafe, dirty conditions with inadequate equipment before being properly settled, and the one-to-one key work scheme meant to support sentence progression was inconsistent. Some wings suffered poor accommodation standards with unacceptable doubling-up of prisoners in single cells, the applications system for prisoner requests was dysfunctional, and there were not enough purposeful activity places for the population, with long waiting lists. Offending behaviour programmes were in short supply, particularly disadvantaging life-sentenced and high-risk prisoners. The Chief Inspector said outcomes were reasonably good in three areas but leaders needed to pay closer attention to the fundamentals to make that consistent across the prison.
Charlie Taylor
HM Chief Inspector of Prisons
October 2022
To read the full reports, go to the HM Inspectorate of Prisons website or follow the links below:
- Inspection report (PDF), Report on an unannounced inspection of HMP Channings Wood by HM Chief Inspector of Prisons (11 & 18–22 July 2022, published 21 October 2022)
- Action plan, HM Prison and Probation Service action plan in response to the 2022 inspection of HMP Channings Wood
- HMP Channings Wood, Report on an unannounced inspection of HMP Channings Wood (3–14 October 2016)