What worked at HMYOI Parc?
“Today, there are fewer than 500 children in custody in England and Wales. This is down largely to the success of diversion schemes over the last 10 years and, more recently, the impact of the pandemic. While this decline in the population is positive for children and society in general, it has created its own set of challenges.”
The children held in custody are now far more likely to have committed serious violent offences and be serving longer sentences than their counterparts just five years ago. This concentration of very high levels of need in a small number of institutions has meant most of the places holding children are volatile, with high levels of reckless and unpredictable violence.
But HMYOI Parc has created a different narrative. Since 2018, we have judged outcomes for the children held there to be reasonably good or good at every inspection. Most recently in April 2022, we gave our highest grade across all four of our healthy prison tests. In this blog Angus Jones, team leader for inspection of children’s custody, discusses what worked at Parc, and how its achievements set the standard for the care of children in all YOIs.
Read the Parc YOI full report and press release, published on 20 July 2022.