‘Trying to make it matter’: The challenges of assimilating a resettlement culture into a ‘local’ prison

As part of the Transforming Rehabilitation reforms, 70 ‘local’ prisons in England and Wales were re-designated as resettlement prisons, order to provide additional through-the-gate support individuals serving short sentences. Drawing on staff prisoner interviews one case study prison, this article considers what challenges involved with implementing a culture local prison. Findings first outline factors inhibiting status prison; these include tension between attempts implement more expansive remit into while also fulfilling long-standing core institutional duties; size churn prison population; wide-scale apathy caused by change fatigue; government austerity policies which significant difficulties day-to-day staffing This then turns practitioner responses re-designation, finding that practitioners interpreted two limited ways: top-down managerial instil wider resistance from officers who felt unwilling or unable expand their roles beyond custodial security concerns. concludes outlining how set inter-related barriers frustrated prisoners alike, eroding sense hope purpose impeding true cultural change.