HMYOI Cookham Wood stopped holding children in May 2024 and reopened the following month as an adult category C prison, run as part of the neighbouring HMP Rochester rather than as a standalone establishment. Its last inspection as a children’s institution was an Independent Review of Progress in April 2024, carried out as the closure was already being announced; the full report can be read on the HM Inspectorate of Prisons website, just follow the links below. In their final report on Cookham Wood as a youth offender institution the inspectors said:
The closure followed a years-long pattern of decline that led inspectors to issue an Urgent Notification in April 2023, when Cookham Wood was rated Poor for safety and purposeful activity and Not Sufficiently Good for care and resettlement, having previously been rated Reasonably Good across all four tests as recently as 2021. The Ministry of Justice announced in March 2024, before this review of progress had even concluded, that the site would stop holding children and be converted to adult use, citing both the establishment’s chronic failure to improve and pressure on adult prison capacity.
By the time of the April 2024 review, the population had already fallen to just 33 boys against a capacity of 120, and some measures had improved: assaults and weapons finds had both fallen by roughly a third since the 2023 inspection, and staff engagement held up better than might have been expected given the uncertainty over their jobs. Inspectors recorded good progress on reducing the acceptance of low standards and on cutting the use of prolonged separation, and reasonable progress on teaching staff numbers.
Despite the falling population, serious violence remained the highest of any young offender institution in England and Wales, almost a third of children said they currently felt unsafe and almost two-thirds said they had felt unsafe at some point during their stay, and boys were still out of their cells for under three hours a day on average. Inspectors found insufficient progress on leadership and oversight, on fixing the underlying breakdown in behaviour management, and on the quality and availability of education. Charlie Taylor, HM Chief Inspector of Prisons, said Cookham Wood had been allowed to fail for years without concerted action, and voiced concern that decisions about the children’s futures were being driven by the need for adult prison bed space rather than by their welfare, with staff and teachers recruited shortly before being told the site would close.
Charlie Taylor
HM Chief Inspector of Prisons
May 2024
To read the full reports, go to the HM Inspectorate of Prisons website or follow the links below:
- Independent Review of Progress report, HM Inspectorate of Prisons final review of progress at HMYOI Cookham Wood (9–17 April 2024, published 21 May 2024)
- Government announcement, confirming HMYOI Cookham Wood would stop holding children and reopen as an adult prison (March 2024)
- Inspection report (PDF), Report on an unannounced inspection of HMYOI Cookham Wood by HM Chief Inspector of Prisons (4–20 April 2023), which led to an Urgent Notification
- Action plan, HM Prison and Probation Service action plan in response to the 2023 Urgent Notification
- Independent Review of Progress report, HM Inspectorate of Prisons review of progress at HMYOI Cookham Wood (2022)