CAT/OP/GBR/CSPRO/1 Monitoring Prisons in Scotland’, published in May 2018 which can be found at https://www.prisonsinspectoratescotland.gov.uk/standards. 192. Standard 2 assesses the Decency of the environment that prisoners are living and working in, In her most recent Annual Report (2019), HM Chief Inspector of Prisons for Scotland records that of the 4 full prison inspections undertaken during the year Decency was rated as being Good at 2 establishments, Generally Acceptable at 1 establishment and poor at another. The establishment given a poor rating – HMP Barlinnie- is an older style Victorian prison which has been earmarked for replacement. Scottish Ministers have also allocated £3 million to refurbish a number of areas of the prison while work takes places on developing the site for and constructing a new prison. C. Institutions for Juvenile Offenders “97. The Subcommittee calls upon the authorities to implement fully the recommendations of the last visit report of HMIP on HMYOI of Cookham Wood.” 193. Following the last visit of HMIP the actions allocated to Cookham Wood YOI have been progressed by the Youth Custody Service and by the establishment (who have updated their response to HMIP and their action plan) with the Governor providing monthly assurance reports to the YCS Prison Group Director (PGD). Following the HMIP/ SPT visit – Cookham Wood YOI appointed staff leads under each of the four Healthy Test areas that HMIP assess. Evaluation meetings are held weekly by each lead to determine progress and challenges. Actions in each area are quality assured and “signed off” by the Governor once completed with a record of all actions stored and maintained. Regarding broader assurance, we have introduced the Monthly Performance Assurance Report process where each functional head provides a report on their areas of performance. This includes an element of “competitive analysis” where reported performance is challenged to ensure its accuracy and feeds into the overall establishment report. 194. It should be noted that this has been taken forward alongside the need to follow physical distancing approaches, in line with national guidance, as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. This has inevitably impacted regime delivery within all sites and has been the primary focus of all secure settings during this time. The priority has been to ensure children have had access to essential activities and enough ‘time out of room’ (as well as engaging activities within rooms), balanced with the need to keep children and staff safe. Whilst time out of room dropped at the start of the pandemic period, given the necessary measures taken to protect all working or living at the site, internal management information suggests that average ‘time out of room’ increased month on month from April to November 2020. Especially following the publication of youth-specific Exceptional Delivery Models in July 2020 which resulted in key aspects of regime such as ‘face to face’ education recommencing at Cookham Wood YOI and although this dropped slightly in December, increased once more in January 2021. Cookham Wood YOI continues to look to increase opportunities for children during this time, in a safe and sustainable manner, wherever local circumstances allow this to occur. 195. Regarding the increased usage of force, we note that levels of Use of Force (UoF) have remained relatively stable over the past twelve months with the overwhelming majority of UoF being used to prevent harm to others. We have taken steps to improve our complaints process and all complaints are quality assured to ensure that our responses address the issues raised and actions are put in place to ensure that similar issues are not repeated. The quality assurance process involves a check to ensure that the respondent to the complaint has spoken to the child as part of their investigation into the matter/s raised. 196. Whilst delivery will continue to be impacted by the pandemic, the Governor and the Cookham Wood team are focused on addressing the recommendations fully through ongoing recovery planning. 29