another short time outside their cell, and a degree of control over this one
activity. Serveries could be staffed by prisoners from the unit, providing them
with an opportunity to demonstrate improved behaviour and staff with an
opportunity to assess their behaviour and ability to appropriately engage with
one another.
■ T
he Department must ensure that all forms of segregation and restraint
are appropriately documented in an electronic register which is regularly
quality assured and examined for trends, issues, and protected characteristics
including ethnic origin, disability, age and gender. Monitoring should be done
on the institutional and national levels.54 Registers should also include a
clear indication of when the segregation or the restraint had been applied
and when they ended, as well as a clear summary of why it was deemed
necessary to use segregation or restraint in any one case.
■ S
egregation documentation / forms should be less cumbersome and more
focused, and review mechanisms must be strengthened to ensure that
placements in a segregation unit are regularly and robustly reviewed. All
documentation must be regularly quality assured for compliance with
procedures and guidelines.
■ T
he Department should consider replicating the Ministry of Health’s ‘
seclusion reporting template’, which requires documentation of alternative
measures attempted, events, reasons for seclusion and so on.
To the
Ministry of Social Development
(Child, Youth and Family)
■ S
ecure Care unit rooms, as observed on visits, were inappropriate for housing
children and young people in a Care and Protection residence or in a Youth
Justice residence. The Ministry should consider alternatives.
■ A
ll rooms where children and young people can spend any length of time
locked up (including ‘time out’ rooms) should be equipped, as a minimum,
with call bells or other means for the young person to communicate with
staff, and these should be checked regularly to ensure that they are in good
working order.
■ W
here the Secure Care Unit is used, children and young people should be
54 In England and Wales all prisons are now required to complete a monthly record of their use of segregation
to the Deputy Director of Custody as well as a quarterly review of their use of force and segregation. See
PSO 1700 (Segregation) https://www.justice.gov.uk/offenders/psos
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