PRT comment: HMP Winchester

Commenting on the findings of conditions at HMP Winchester by HM Inspectorate of Prisons today (25 May), Peter Dawson, director of the Prison Reform Trust said:

“When prisoners spend all day locked in their cell, talk about rehabilitation is just pie in the sky. It’s hard to imagine a bleaker assessment than when the Chief Inspector writes ‘staffing levels were not sufficient to deliver a decent regime and current recruitment did not keep pace with staff departures’. This is not about Covid and it’s not solved by building new prisons. This report shows the government urgently need to get to grips with the basics of delivering a safe and decent prison system.”