Children locked in cells for 23 hours a day despite inspectors calling policy ‘unacceptable’

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Children are being locked in their rooms for 23 hours a day in a youth jail, despite watchdogs warning nearly a year ago that confining youngsters in their cells for such long periods is “unacceptable”.

A monitoring report into Oakhill secure training centre in Milton Keynes by Ofsted, the Prison Inspectorate and the Care Quality Commission warns that “widespread failings” are having a “significant impact” on the care and well-being of child inmates.

Records published by the centre, which currently holds 46 boys between the ages of 12 and 17, show that children have spent approximately 19 hours per day on average locked in their rooms - increasing to 23 hours on some days.

Inspectors said there were concerns over the accuracy of the centre’s data, indicating that the time children have spent locked into their rooms could be higher than that reported by the centre.

It comes 10 months after the same inspectors issued an urgent warning to England’s only other secure training centre, Rainsbrook, in Rugby, after it emerged children held there were being locked in cells for 23 and a half hours a day and subjected to a “spartan” regime.

In June of this year, the government made the decision to remove all 45 children living in the jail to other custodial settings, with then justice secretary Robert Buckland saying he had been “left with no choice” due to the “very serious failings” at Rainsbrook.

Campaigners said the Oakhill report should be the “final straw” and that the government should close secure training centres to ensure that children in trouble are “given the care and support they need".

Anna McMorrin MP, shadow minister for victims and youth justice, described an “alarming pattern of failure” across the youth justice system and accused ministers of “repeatedly failed to act on past warnings”.

“It is time for the government to commission an independent review of youth custody, as Labour have called for, to get a grip on this spiralling crisis,” she said.

As well as highlighting concerns about the long periods boys spend in their cells, the new report notes that the temperatures in children’s living units and in other parts of Oakhill were “too high”, leading to an environment in summer months that is “not conducive to positive care”.

“There was no means of cooling the children’s living units or staff administration areas. This makes living and working at the centre very uncomfortable at best,” the report states.

Children told inspectors activities were being cancelled at the last minute, usually linked to a lack of staffing. The centre’s records show that, on the vast majority of days in July and August 2021, minimum staffing levels to ensure the safe and appropriate care of children were not met.

Staff told inspectors that their morale was “very low” and that they did not feel supported by managers. The report notes: “The way in which centre staff encourage children to develop positive behaviours and social skills is in disarray.”

Inspectors conclude that children’s day-to-day experiences are “very poor” and that “little progress has been made” since similar concerns, particularly those relating to staffing, were raised by inspectors at the previous inspection in May 2021.

Andrew Neilson, director of campaigns at the Howard League for Penal Reform, said: “The distressing realities revealed in this inspection report echo what the Howard League has seen through its own legal work with children in custody during the pandemic and before, with boys locked in their cells for hours on end without fresh air or face-to-face education.

"The Howard League opposed the creation of secure training centres in the 1990s. In the decades since, hundreds of boys and girls have been harmed and abused while private companies have profited from their misery.

"This report on Oakhill should be the final straw. It is time to close the secure training centres and ensure that boys and girls in trouble are given the care and support they need.”

A spokesperson for Oakhill said the safety of children was “paramount”, adding: “Earlier this year, staff numbers at Oakhill were severely depleted by the impact of Covid-19 as significant numbers of staff were required, under prevailing regulations, to self-isolate at home.

“In these unprecedented circumstances, managers at Oakhill had to adopt a restricted operating regime, including remote learning for children from their rooms.”

They said that since the Ofsted visit, Oakhill’s operating regime for children had “improved” and that over the past month children had been able to spend on average 12 hours out of their rooms daily and education in classrooms had been “restored”.

The Ministry of Justice has been approached for comment.