Report criticises design faults at new 拢200m HMP Oakwood 鈥榮uper prison鈥�
A 拢200m newly-built prison has been slammed by the prisons watchdog after its inspection of the facility uncovered serious design faults.
The report by the Independent Monitoring Board into HMP Oakwood, a privately-run prison near Wolverhampton, identified a number of serious design faults.
The facility, run by G4S, is the UK鈥檚 newest privately-run jail.
It was designed by architect Pick Everard for the Ministry of Justice (MoJ), with Kier the main contractor and Faithful + Gould the project manager.
The report said building work was still ongoing at the prison when it opened in April 2012, with cells still to be fitted out, and that contractors had been 鈥渃ontinually in the prison dealing with deficiencies and are not expected to complete remedial work until later in 2013鈥�.
The report said 鈥渁 number of the issues鈥� identified with the design and layout of the prison were the consequence of 鈥渃ost-cutting initiatives being implemented after the original design specification was agreed鈥�.
The report was particularly critical of the design of the main hub areas for the prison staff, which it said 鈥渉ave no natural light [and] limited air circulation or air conditioning鈥�. It said this meant the areas became 鈥渧ery stuffy鈥�.
鈥淎ccess to staff toilets is directly from the central hub area and [is] not conducive to the existing poor air quality within the hub office,鈥� the report added.
It said stairwells were not adequately covered by CCTV, which meant they had become locations 鈥渨here incidents are occurring鈥�.
It said other problems included the 鈥渕etal design of the buildings鈥�, which meant the radio systems did not work properly throughout the facility with 鈥渕any blackspots鈥�.
It said to address this failing had required additional work costing 拢400,000.
It also highlighted that the prison had only one outer fence, rather than two, which meant accomplices were able to throw mobile phones, drugs and other items easily into the prison grounds. These were then retrieved by prisoners who had discovered that setting off fire alarms triggered the windows in the prison blocks to open, enabling them to 鈥済o fishing鈥� for the contraband.
It also highlighted the poor quality of furniture in the prison, made of 鈥渓ight fibreboard鈥�, which it said was 鈥渆asy to break up when a prisoner is angry鈥�. 鈥淔ragmented furniture has been used as a weapon against staff,鈥� the report said.
Pick Everard, Faithful + Gould and Kier declined to comment, referring all enquiries to the MoJ.
An MoJ spokesperson said: 鈥淭he MoJ was responsible for the original building design and imposed no 鈥榗ost-cutting鈥� measures after the final contract award.鈥�
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