Last year Cookham Wood Young Offender's Institute was placed into emergency measures following this report. Now, some believe change is happening too slowly after an update was provided to the Children and Young People Overview and Scrutiny committee last Thursday.
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00:00 A youth prison with a troubling recent past. Last April a report by the Inspectorate of
00:06 Prisons into Young Offenders Institute, Cookham Woods, near Rochester was published. It revealed
00:12 what they described as extremely concerning findings and the near total breakdown in behaviour
00:19 management with more than 200 weapons found in the lead up to the inspection.
00:25 Just six months on from the report there are still concerns that this prison is changing
00:30 too slowly with a rise in staff resignations by 20% as well as a rise in isolation cases
00:36 after an initial fall.
00:39 This is just appalling. I mean this is not acceptable in any way, shape or form.
00:48 Councillor George Perfect doesn't mince his words and doesn't think change at this prison
00:53 is happening fast enough.
00:54 Well change is certainly happening. I think the Deputy Chief Executive made that clear
00:57 and the council are getting involved in that. But we at the moment are not confident that
01:01 this is changing at pace. And if you look at for example Ofsted reports of other institutions,
01:06 whether it be social care settings or indeed education within the area, those organisations
01:12 move at pace. We didn't have confidence from the report and the presentation from the Deputy
01:17 Governor last Thursday that things are changing at a pace and that the Ministry of Justice
01:21 have got a grip on this.
01:22 Another cabinet member from Midway Council's Children's Services says getting out of emergency
01:27 measures will take time.
01:30 We did have our ILAC inspection for children's social care for our main provision of services
01:36 and that took us four years to move from inadequate to good. I'm really pleased that we've now
01:43 attained good. I think the only way is up really after a report like that. But clearly
01:48 they've appointed a new Governor, they've appointed the new Deputy Governor who came
01:52 to her first scrutiny meeting last week. So all the building blocks are starting to be
01:56 put into place.
01:57 A Prison Service spokesperson told KMTV that "Cook & Wood is home to some of society's
02:02 most troubled children and we are working hard to drive the long-term change needed
02:07 to address challenges in supporting them. A new Governor is providing stronger leadership
02:13 and we continue to bring in extra resources from across the estate to give staff the support
02:18 they need to improve conditions and help more children turn their backs on crime."
02:25 But with such deep-rooted problems, the path to improvement will be a long one.
02:31 Oliver Leeds of the Sacks reporting for KMTV.