PARLIAMENTARY WRITTEN QUESTION
Feltham Young Offender Institution (12 January 2015)

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many times children have been subject to single unlock at HM Young Offender Institution Feltham in each month in 2014; and how many children were subject to single unlock at that institution in each of those months.

Asked by:
Seema Malhotra (Labour)

Discipline Procedures are central to the maintenance of a safe custodial environment. They are provided for by the Young Offender Institution (YOI) Rules which require adjudications to be conducted lawfully, fairly and justly, and for young people to have a full opportunity to hear what is alleged against them and to present their case. A possible outcome of an adjudication hearing is for a young person to be removed from their wing or living unit for a period of up to 21 days under YOI R 60 (1) (g). Removal from unit means that the young person is relocated to other accommodation within the establishment but otherwise continues to participate, as far as possible, in normal regime activities. No young people were given an adjudication award of removal from unit at Feltham in 2014.

Young people in custody are some of the most vulnerable people in society and their safety and welfare is our highest priority. We aim to use segregation as little as possible, but there are occasions when behaviour is so challenging and violent that it is necessary to remove a young person from association in order to guarantee their safety and that of others.

Young people detained in under 18 public sector Young Offender Institutions (YOIs) must only be segregated when absolutely necessary. This may be to protect the safety of persons living in, working in or visiting an establishment, for their own protection, for a short period pending an adjudication hearing or to maintain order and discipline. Young people must be segregated under the proper authority as provided by the YOI Rules. Any decision to segregate a young person is subject to regular review and a range of safeguarding measures are in place to ensure appropriate oversight of their care. There are careful limits placed on the length of time for which young people can be separated and they cannot be segregated as a punishment.

Table A below shows the ethnicity of young people located in the Care and Separation Unit (CSU) at Feltham in each month of 2014.

Table A

	Jan	Feb	Mar	Apr	May	June	July	Aug	Sept	Oct	Nov	Dec
Asian	4	3	4	0	2	4	3	3	5	5	2	2
Black	16	14	23	24	6	7	9	10	17	45	17	20
Mixed	8	0	4	2	2	3	6	6	7	6	11	5
White British	5	8	5	3	4	5	4	6	11	11	2	14
White Irish	0	0	0	0	0	1	0	0	1	0	0	0
White Other	0	0	0	2	1	0	1	0	0	0	0	0
Other	5	0	2	0	0	1	0	0	0	0	3	0
Not Stated	0	0	0	0	0	1	0	0	0	0	0	0

We are unable to give a definitive reason for the dips and spikes in figures around particular months in the table above as it is normal for the numbers to fluctuate. However, we know that this is consistent with data on assaults from the establishment which may be a contributory factor. We also know that in October there were a number of multi perpetrator assaults which led to a large number of young people being segregated for short periods of time in the immediate aftermath.

Information on the number of young people located on Feltham’s CSU who have an identified mental health condition, and information on the number of young people subject to Feltham’s single unlock policy, is not collected centrally. In order to provide this information we would need to check individual records and this could only be done at disproportionate cost.

Answered by:
Andrew Selous (Conservative)
15 January 2015