Background to this inspection
Updated
13 January 2020
IRC Colnbrook is an immigration removal centre in Harmondsworth, West London, adjacent to Heathrow Airport. Colnbrook and the neighbouring Harmondsworth site are run jointly as IRC Heathrow by Mitie Care and Custody. At the time of the inspection, the centre held about 250 detainees.
CNWL is the main health provider at IRC Colnbrook. The trust is registered with CQC to provide the following regulated activities at the location: Treatment of disease, disorder or injury, and Diagnostic and screening procedures.
Our last joint inspection with HMIP was in December 2018. The joint inspection report can be found at:
https://www.justiceinspectorates.gov.uk/hmiprisons/wp-content/uploads/sites/4/2019/04/Colnbrook-web-2018.pdf
Updated
13 January 2020
We carried out an announced focused inspection of healthcare services provided by Central and North West London NHS Foundation Trust (CNWL) at IRC Colnbrook (branded as IRC Heathrow) on 19 November 2019.
Following our last joint inspection with Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Prisons (HMIP) in December 2018, we found that the quality of healthcare provided by CNWL at this location required improvement. We issued a Requirement Notice in relation to Regulation 17, Good governance, of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (Regulated Activities) Regulations 2014.
The purpose of the inspection was to determine if the healthcare services provided by CNWL were meeting the legal requirements of the above regulations, under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008.
We do not currently rate services provided in immigration detention centres.
At this inspection, we found that:
- Staff routinely used formal language translation services and no longer asked detainees to translate during health consultations.
- Detainees could access a wide range of range of translated written information about healthcare services and health promotion information.
- The provision and oversight of managerial and clinical supervision had improved.