Prison violence, drugs and self-harm rates 'still too high'

Drug abuse rates of self-harm at a North West prison are still far too high, a watchdog has found.

HMP Altcourse in Fazakerley, Liverpool, has not managed to reduce either since the last inspection in July, according to His Majesty's Chief Inspector of Prisons, Charlie Taylor.

He said leaders had "responded positively" to many of the findings since a highly critical review in 2025, but there was still insufficient progress in some areas.

Taylor said the jail, which was holding 1,100 male prisoners at the time of the review, was "managing significant population pressures".

The review visit followed up on ten concerns raised by inspectors at its last full inspection of the category B reception prison which took place in 2025.

Altcourse is meant to serve the courts of Cheshire, parts of Merseyside and Bolton.

But because of national prison population pressures, prisoners were routinely diverted from out of the area, most notably from Forrest Bank in Salford.

At the time of the review, nearly a third of prisoners were on licence recall, one of the highest proportions currently in the reception estate, which is made of up prisons which are the first that offenders are sent to when sentenced by the courts.

Taylor noted this put extra demand on areas offender management, public protection and resettlement.

"Despite the hard work we saw, progress remained uneven," Taylor said.

"Drug use remained too high, rates of violence had not reduced, and self-harm rates remained among the highest for reception prisons."

The review also found too many prisoners were still released homeless.

At the last inspection, 24% of prisoners had been released homeless which had marginally cut to 20% at the time of the review.

"Work to promote fair treatment remained underdeveloped, too many patients still waited far too long for transfer to mental health hospital, and weaknesses in public protection and accommodation outcomes for prisoners going into the community persisted," Taylor said.

Taylor found leaders had "responded positively to many of our findings".

He said they had "strengthened oversight, governance and use of data, particularly in health care, where investment had improved staffing and access to care".

He said substantial investment in health care had improved staffing, governance and access to care.

Taylor said Ofsted also found reasonable progress across all three education, skills and work themes they had raised.

Inspectors highlighted an example of notable positive practice which other prisons may be able to learn from or replicate.

They found leaders had developed an effective method to record and review prisoners' skills development in work and the report said prisoners appreciated how they were able to recognise their skills and how to improve them.

Food had also improved with leaders acting on prisoner feedback.

Taylor said leaders "often demonstrated a much better understanding of the risks and challenges facing the prison" than inspectors found at last year's inspection.

He said this was particularly evident in the approach to violence, self-harm and drugs "where improved analysis and scrutiny had provided a stronger basis for decision-making and the development of more targeted responses".

He added leaders made better use of information to understand risks and vulnerabilities and had introduced several initiatives in response.

The chief inspector said the prison was "managing significant population pressures".

The report said the reception unit was one of the busiest in England and Wales, with 950 admissions in June 2026.

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