Source · IMB Annual Report
Wayland
Year: 2023
Published: 19 Dec 2023
Type: Prison · Cat C
Recommendations: 15
Key concerns
Positive findings
This report on HMP Wayland, based on a prisoner attitudes survey ending March 2023, highlights significant concerns across various aspects of prison life. Key issues include ineffective induction, poor staff-prisoner trust and communication, and a failure of the key worker scheme. Prisoners report feeling unsafe, lacking support for resettlement, and facing challenges with property, healthcare access, and the complaints system, alongside issues in education provision. The Board emphasizes a general lack of curiosity from management regarding these persistent problems, underscoring the need for fundamental improvements.
Positive findings
The Board welcomes the recent revamp of the Induction period, providing an opportunity to create a more positive initial experience for prisoners. There has been a continued emphasis on basic decency, with a welcome improvement in equipping cells with furniture (up from 51% to 71%) and easier access to cleaning materials. The reported feeling of loneliness has reduced from 78% in 2022 to 66% in 2023, and visits have significantly increased from 48% to 70%, with the Family Development team likely contributing to this success.
Key concerns
Regime/Time Out of Cell
Repeated
Poor induction experience, with two-thirds of prisoners finding it unhelpful.
Regime/Time Out of Cell
The experience of Induction, the responses are in the negative, depressingly so for two-thirds of prisoners received into Wayland each year.
Regime/Time Out of Cell
Repeated
Lack of effective communication regarding the regime and future changes.
Regime/Time Out of Cell
The 2023 negative response regarding the prison communicating well regarding regime and what will happen in future has increased to 69%.
Staffing
Repeated
Low staff-prisoner trust (57% do not trust staff) stemming from broken promises, poor attitudes, and perceived unfairness.
Staffing
Only 40% (2023) responded that the staff were able to help with personal problems on arrival.
Staffing
Repeated
Inconsistently resourced and managed key working scheme with marginal impact on prisoners.
Estate/Conditions
Almost two thirds of prisoners did NOT believe their cell was as clean as they had expected a prison cell to be (61% negative).
Safety
Repeated
Persistent feelings of unsafety among prisoners (21% currently feel unsafe).
Estate/Conditions
Almost half the respondents in 2023 (43%) said their washbasin/shower/toilet in their cell was NOT clean, with some uncleanliness appearing longstanding.
Safety
Repeated
Profound lack of trust among prisoners themselves (68% trust none or very few others).
Estate/Conditions
A full third of prisoners still claim that it is not easy to get cleaning materials.
Resettlement/Release
Repeated
Near-zero perceived staff help with personal problems about life after release (only 4% feel helped).
Regime/Time Out of Cell
Repeated
Three-quarters of respondents (75%) said they had NOT signed a cell acceptance form, a finding consistently reported since 2019.
Education/Purposeful Activity
Significant damage to life chances for prisoners due to missed education and programs during Covid-restricted regimes.
Estate/Conditions
Repeated
23% of prisoners claim that they do not get clean bedding weekly, despite previous assurances that the system for requesting it was improved.
Regime/Time Out of Cell
Repeated
Worsening property handling, with two-thirds of property still missing after reception.
Mental Health
A significant number of respondents have consistently reported feeling lonely in Wayland (66% in 2023).
Healthcare
Repeated
Declining ease of making healthcare appointments and high dissatisfaction (two-thirds) with healthcare complaint outcomes.
Staffing
Of those prisoners who admitted an approach to staff due to their loneliness, 82% reported that staff were NOT able to help.
Complaints/Property
Repeated
Perceived unfairness in the formal complaints (Comp 1/1A) system (75% find it unfair).
Staffing
The split between respondents who trusted staff against those who did not has remained astonishingly stable at roughly 45%/55% (43% Yes, 57% No in 2023) over four years, indicating a persistent lack of trust.
Education/Purposeful Activity
Repeated
Poor system for managing and returning educational materials with feedback.
Staffing
Key working has neither been consistently resourced nor managed, with marginal impact on prisoners. Two-thirds (65%) said their key worker had never spoken with them, and 48% reported never speaking with their key worker.
Education/Purposeful Activity
Repeated
Insufficient library book provision and lack of digitisation.
Safety
The figure claiming not to have felt safe on arrival or after is stable at between 21% and 22%.
Other
Repeated
Lack of curiosity from management about prisoner feedback and experiences.
Safety
In 2023, the figure for prisoners reporting they could trust no, or at most one or two, other prisoners had grown to 68% (from 56% in 2022).
Resettlement/Release
Only 4% of prisoners thought that staff were helping with personal problems likely on release, while 96% said they had not, described as the 'worst sort of result there could be for a prison which is meant to be a training and resettlement prison'.
Resettlement/Release
59% of prisoners reported having missed out on programs required by their release plan or for their parole case.
Education/Purposeful Activity
56% of prisoners believe that a lack of education during lockdown will affect their life chances after release.
Other
Repeated
Two-thirds (67%) of prisoners said all their property had not been received within two weeks of reception, and 66% reported it was still missing at the time of the survey. Property issues continue to be the leading subject for IMB applications.
Healthcare
Ease of making an appointment with various healthcare specialists dropped by seven percentage points from an already low 28.75% in 2022 to 21.5% in 2023.
Healthcare
Two-thirds (70%) of prisoners expressed dissatisfaction with the responses to their healthcare complaints, with the dial not shifting from 2022.
Complaints/Property
The perceived fairness in the Comp 1 and 1A system is stark, with 75% of prisoners reporting it as unfair (25% fair). The Board frequently finds responses to complaints to be limited, unhelpful, and sometimes unacceptable.
Regime/Time Out of Cell
The perceived utility of Prisoner Forums has dropped steadily over the last three years, from 68% in 2021 to 32% in 2023.
Education/Purposeful Activity
Only 32% of prisoners said they had had a response to returned education materials after cell work, a drop from 44% in 2022 and 43% in 2021.
Education/Purposeful Activity
50% of prisoners said they could not get educational materials when educational attendance was not possible.
Education/Purposeful Activity
Repeated
The availability of library books worsened, with 55% of prisoners reporting not having sufficient library books in 2023, a reversal from 45% in 2022, despite the Board consistently calling for improvement and digitisation.
Regime/Time Out of Cell
Prisoners mention '22 hour bang up everyday' and '23 hours a day' as part of the regime.
Staffing
Prisoners comment on staff attitudes including 'very bad attitudes', 'corruption', 'all lie they don’t like Pakistanis', 'lazy', and 'lack of respect'.
Equality/Diversity
A prisoner notes: 'The all lie they don’t like Pakistanis'.
Substance Misuse
A prisoner suggests stopping 'drugs from coming into prison this would keep inmates from fighting and make this place a safe place to be in'.
Food/Catering
Prisoners complain about the canteen ('More option on Canteen') and food quality ('Better food').
Staffing
OMU (Offender Management Unit) is described as 'terrible. No objectivity. Poor training, no cover for sickness or absence.' and 'Not fit for purpose!'
Recommendations
| # | Recommendation | Addressee | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The IMB would recommend that the volume and tone of the communication, at this confusing period in a prisoner’s life, when he is only hours after his reception, be reviewed for content, necessity, and a more positive tone. | Governor / Director | |
| 2 | The IMB suspects that this important contingent of a prisoner’s social life, and therefore his social health, is not given the attention it needs and would recommend that prison management review the issue to examine other prisons’ experiences and, possibly, knowledge of how to address this issue successfully. | Governor / Director | |
| 3 | We recommend that this issue [lesser immediacy of communication need as perceived by the prison’s management after Covid] is at least considered for review. | Governor / Director | |
| 4 | The Board sees no alternative to a continuing programme of staff training and supervision [for key working], and, of course, staff doing the supervising must not only had that training themselves but also the experience that goes with it. | Governor / Director | |
| 5 | The IMB would recommend that the volume and tone of the communication, at this confusing period in a prisoner’s life, when he is only hours after his reception, be reviewed for content, necessity, and a more positive tone. | Governor / Director | |
| 6 | We urge the Healthcare Contractor to consider these findings and review their contact management systems. | Other | |
| 7 | The IMB would recommend that prison management review the issue [loneliness] to examine other prisons’ experiences and, possibly, knowledge of how to address this issue successfully. | Governor / Director | |
| 8 | We urge the healthcare contractor to consider how this situation [dissatisfaction with healthcare complaint outcomes] can be improved. | Other | |
| 9 | We urge the Healthcare Contractor to consider these findings [ease of making appointments] and review their contact management systems. | Other | |
| 10 | We now ask, however, for prison management to take note of these findings and seek to ensure that the outcome for prisoners involved in the complaints process is at least improved in regard to the precepts of procedural justice, and also, perhaps, seek to provide opportunity to discuss the felt-fairness of complaint responses with prisoners as part of key working. | Governor / Director | |
| 11 | We urge the healthcare contractor to consider how this situation [dissatisfaction with complaint results] can be improved. | Other | |
| 12 | Perhaps, considering how much digital communication is now relied upon, prison management should seek to discover why there has been this significant reduction [in perceived utility of Prisoner Forums]. | Governor / Director | |
| 13 | We now ask, however, for prison management to take note of these findings [complaints system fairness] and seek to ensure that the outcome for prisoners involved in the complaints process is at least improved in regard to the precepts of procedural justice, and also, perhaps, seek to provide opportunity to discuss the felt-fairness of complaint responses with prisoners as part of key working. | Governor / Director | |
| 14 | only a full digitisation of the library catalogue will provide the sort of comparable access as is available in the wider community. Repeated | Governor / Director | |
| 15 | Prison management should seek to discover why there has been this significant reduction [in the perceived utility of Prisoner Forums]. | Governor / Director |
Related inspections & investigations
26 Jan 2026
HMIP · Unannounced
Other reports for Wayland
Report details
- Establishment
- Wayland
- Type
- Prison · Cat C
- Report year
- 2023
- Published
- 19 December 2023
- Responsible body
- HMP Wayland
- Recommendations
- 15
- MoJ rating (2024/25)
- 3 — Good