Prison
Cat C, YOI
Key Concerns Identified
Positive Findings
Portland
IMB Annual Report 2025 · Published 8 December 2025
HMP/YOI Portland has seen significant improvements in its regime and overall safety, with positive staff-prisoner relationships and increased key work. However, persistent challenges include the ingress of illicit substances, inadequate ventilation in Beaufort wing, and insufficient purposeful activity. Healthcare staffing has improved, but mental health provision is still stretched due to rising demand, and external transport issues continue to affect prisoner movements and initial health screenings.
Positive Findings
The Board observed a generally safe and humane environment, with strong leadership in safety and positive relationships between staff and prisoners, enhanced by increased key work sessions. Healthcare provision improved significantly with full staffing and the introduction of wing-based representatives. There was commendable progress in securing accommodation for 90% of prisoners on release and an increase in purposeful activity places, leading to positive engagement in education and vocational training.
Key Concerns
Substance Misuse
Repeated
The ingress of illicit substances continued to be an issue, proving a challenge despite increased finds, and the Board is concerned about prisoner debt increasing the risk of self-harm.
Estate/Conditions
Repeated
In hot weather, the conditions in Beaufort, the most recently built wing, remain uncomfortable due to inadequate insulation and extremely poor ventilation, an issue raised in last year’s report.
Education/Purposeful Activity
The prison has not provided sufficient activity spaces to enable every eligible prisoner to have the opportunity to attend work and/or education full time.
Mental Health
Although the prison has increased the staffing numbers for mental health, they are inadequate to treat the number of prisoners who have ongoing mental health issues.
Other
Issues during the reporting year with late arrivals to the prison due to Serco transport issues, resulting in some prisoners not receiving a first-night health screening and affecting transfers to and from other establishments.
Regime/Time Out of Cell
The Board would like to see the number of social video calls increase substantially during the next reporting period, as there are only four slots available over four days per week, making it difficult for families to book a session, essential for families outside the south west region.
Safety
The Board would like to see further improvement with ACCT plans.
Staffing
Recruitment is challenging, as pay and conditions are nowhere near attractive enough to compete with outside employment opportunities, and changes in visa requirements for foreign workers are an upcoming concern.
Board Commentary
Staffing
The prison benefitted from improved staffing levels across the board, with recruitment drives successfully filling officer posts and healthcare staff posts. However, recruitment remains challenging due to uncompetitive pay and upcoming visa requirement changes for foreign workers. Despite an increase in mental health professionals, these numbers are still considered inadequate for the growing caseload. Key worker sessions have also significantly increased, fostering better staff-prisoner relationships.
Healthcare
Oxleas NHS Foundation Trust provides healthcare with all staff posts filled, ensuring timely medication and reducing missed appointments. However, the healthcare unit itself is in an unsuitable Victorian building. While mental health transfers improved, the significant increase in prisoners with mental health needs means current staffing levels for mental health are inadequate for a caseload of 110. Dental waiting times remain at eight weeks for routine appointments, with 60 men on the waiting list.
Regime & Daily Life
The regime improved significantly, operating as fully functional on weekdays for most of the year, a marked improvement from the previous year. Prisoners typically receive 6.5 hours out of cell daily for exercise, association, education, or workshops. However, the prison still lacks sufficient purposeful activity places to ensure all eligible prisoners can attend full-time, leading to many spending most of their day in their cells. Social activities on wings are also limited, particularly for young offenders.
Applications to the IMB
Prisoners can apply to their IMB about any aspect of their treatment. This table shows application counts by category.
| Category | Current | Previous | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Accommodation, including laundry, clothing, ablutions | 9 | 13 | |
| Canteen, facility list, catalogue(s) | 0 | 6 | |
| Discipline, including adjudications, incentives scheme, sanctions | 0 | 1 | |
| Equality | 5 | 1 | |
| Finance, including pay, private monies, spends | 10 | 7 | |
| Food and kitchens | 5 | 6 | |
| Health, including physical, mental, social care | 28 | 29 | |
| Letters, visits, telephones, public protection restrictions | 8 | 6 | |
| Miscellaneous, including complaints system | 13 | 13 | — |
| Property during transfer or in another establishment or location | 24 | 25 | |
| Property within this establishment | 29 | 43 | |
| Purposeful activity, including education, work, training, library, regime, time out of cell | 26 | 9 | |
| Sentence management, including HDC (home detention curfew), ROTL (release on temporary licence), parole, release dates, recategorisation | 26 | 43 | |
| Staff/prisoner concerns, including bullying | 11 | 14 | |
| Transfers | 19 | 8 |
Recommendations (10)
Ministry of Justice: 4
HMPPS: 3
Governor / Director: 3
1 repeated
Recommendation 1
The Minister should plan to support the Prison Service to reduce the prevalence of drugs and other illicit substances across the estate.
Ministry of Justice
Substance Misuse
Recommendation 2
The Minister should take steps to support the Prison Service in providing additional purposeful activity across HMP/YOI Portland.
Ministry of Justice
Purposeful Activity
Recommendation 3
The Minister should take steps to ensure that the Prison Service does not lose staff on work visas, given the change in the minimum salary visa requirements when the profession does not offer competitive remuneration.
Ministry of Justice
Staffing
Recommendation 4
The Minister should plan to support the Prison Service to help manage the complex mental health of needs of prisoners so that they receive appropriate care and support.
Ministry of Justice
Mental Health
Recommendation 5
HMPPS should provide extra support for prisons to hire additional staff for pre-release teams and offender management teams as the early release programme continues to evolve.
HMPPS
Staffing
Recommendation 6
HMPPS should take steps to address the poor service provided by external suppliers, with particular attention on the quality of service provided by Serco with regard to the transport of prisoners.
HMPPS
Other
Recommendation 7
Repeated
Prev. unaddressed
HMPPS should, as a matter of urgency, arrange for the necessary funding to be made available to address the ventilation issues on Beaufort wing during spells of hot weather.
HMPPS
Estate
Recommendation 8
The Governor should undertake steps to ensure that key work continues to increase so all prisoners benefit on a regular basis.
Governor / Director
Regime
Recommendation 9
The Governor should plan to reduce illicit substances entering the establishment.
Governor / Director
Substance Misuse
Recommendation 10
The Governor should plan to work with HMPPS to secure resources to provide additional purposeful activities and expand the education offering.
Governor / Director
Purposeful Activity
Other IMB Reports for Portland
PPO Fatal Incidents
Prisons and Probation Ombudsman fatal incident investigations for this establishment.
Prevention of Future Deaths Reports
Coroner PFD reports issued to this establishment.