The Chief Inspector of Prisons has warned of serious failings across the Long-Term High-Security Estate (LTHSE) after putting HMP Woodhill into special measures in March 2026.
Inspectors have already issued Urgent Notifications (UNs) to two other LTHSE prisons: Swaleside last December and Manchester in 2024.
According to Charlie Taylor, Woodhill, which had received a UN in 2023, remained violent and riddled with drugs. He said education and training had almost stopped for a month. In his view, the jail needs sustained and significant support from the Prison Service to recover.
Mr Taylor drew links between the problems at Woodhill and Swaleside. He said: “Prisoners at both jails spent far too long locked in their cells with nothing to do, adding to their frustration and fuelling drug-taking, poor behaviour and disorder.”
He added: “Both prisons were dirty, in need of major refurbishment, and profoundly failing in their roles as training establishments.”
Swaleside and Woodhill findings
HM Inspectorate of Prisons (HMIP) also published its report on the Swaleside inspection that prompted the UN there. According to Mr Taylor, 75 per cent of men at the jail felt unsafe. He said drug use was rife and drones regularly entered the prison. Self-harm stayed consistently high, and there were too many cell fires.
Inspectors also recorded low staff morale and filthy wings. Almost half of the prisoners spent less than an hour a day out of their cells. HMIP found that Government cuts to the education budget had harmed prisoners’ chances of finding work after release.
At Woodhill, inspectors found a 45 per cent rise in attacks on staff, alongside dirty conditions and severe staff shortages. Mr Taylor said it particularly concerned him that both prisons, as part of the LTHSE, were now in special measures.
HMP Woodhill is a high-security men’s prison in the South East region. Its previous full inspection, in November 2023, rated safety and purposeful activity as poor. Inspectors judged respect and rehabilitation and release planning not sufficiently good.
Reaction
Pia Sinha, chief executive of the Prison Reform Trust, said the findings showed two institutions falling badly short of their basic duty to provide safety, rehabilitation and purpose. She said they were far from isolated cases.
She described violence, criminality and the demand for drugs as symptoms of a system in crisis. Overcrowding, staff inexperience and a lack of meaningful rehabilitative activity kept cycles of harm and reoffending going, she said.
Ms Sinha said: “The fact that both Woodhill and Swaleside hold some of our highest risk prisoners makes these failings even more shocking.”
She welcomed the appointment of experienced governors at both prisons. However, she warned that they could not succeed without sustained and significant support from the Government.
