Independent monitors highlight better living conditions but continued safety concerns at HMP Lewes

Better living conditions but continued concerns about safety at HMP Lewes feature prominently in the Independent Monitoring Board’s (IMB) annual report for 2024/25, published today (8 July 2025).

The Board welcomes the big increase in the amount of time prisoners can spend out of their cells for activities such as exercise, work and education, and recognises the work of the prison’s leadership and staff to make and sustain this change.

• It notes that this has been achieved despite increases in the prison population over the year, when at times HMP Lewes was effectively full. The prison has also dealt with increased numbers of remand and short-term recall prisoners, which can present added challenges in maintaining a safe and stable regime.

The Board praises higher standards of cleanliness across the wings and improvements to the condition of some cells and communal areas through a programme of refurbishment and redecoration work done by prisoners themselves.

But given that most of the wings at HMP Lewes were initially built nearly 200 years ago, the prison still requires considerable added investment to support decent living and working standards. Problems with the heating and hot water supply have at times meant unacceptably hot or cold conditions for prisoners and staff alike.

The Board finds that the reception and induction processes for new prisoners have improved, but safety concerns continue to trouble the Board. Its report finds that:

• Prisoner assaults against staff rose by 15%, with 79 incidents.
• Prisoner self-harm rose by 5% to 651 cases, though the rate of increase has slowed and most incidents are classed as low in severity.
• Prisoner-on-prisoner violence fell by 16%, with 194 incidents.
• There was a 25% increase in the number of incidents when officers felt required to use force against prisoners, to 721 cases.
• Drugs, weapons and mobile phones are too readily available.
• Some areas of the prison are still not covered by CCTV, posing a risk to staff and prisoners alike.

Against these concerns, the Board welcomes improvements in the quality of the prison’s resettlement services to help prisoners prepare for their release, and in the prison’s education and healthcare provision.

However, the Board was significantly troubled about gaps in psychiatry, and notes that there was in effect no psychiatrist in the prison for most of summer 2024. The Board calls for greater mental health service provision for prisoners going forward.

IMB Lewes Vice-Chair, Nick Fairclough, said:

“We welcome the clear evidence that the prison has become a better place compared with this time last year.

Time out of cell has increased significantly for most prisoners and the physical environment is improving.

All of this is undoubtably good for the wellbeing of the prison community and the Board notes the general improvement in the atmosphere across the establishment.

However, the Board is still concerned about high levels of violence and rates of prisoner self-harm, though we welcome some recent signs of improvement.

Our monitoring suggests that greater mental health service provision and support for prisoners in mental health distress could help bring about further reductions to levels of violence and-self harm.

In particular we call for an increase in specialist psychiatry within the prison and for greater provision of secure mental health facilities nationally, reducing the time that prisoners in need of such accommodation might be forced to wait before transfer.”