BLANTYRE House Prison, near Goudhurst, has received high praise from the Prison Reform Trust after a study of the nation's jails during the last year.

In its report, The Prisons League Table, the trust examined the record of the country's jails in meeting the Government's declared Key Performance Indicators (KPIs).

Although it found that nationwide the Government was failing to meet six of its own targets, Blantyre House had performed particularly well in three areas.

The Government had set the KPI target of a maximum of nine per cent for the number of assaults within prisons on wardens or other inmates.

The male juvenile prison at Ashfield had the worst record with an assault rate of 74 per cent, but Blantyre was one of 14 jails where there were no recorded assaults at all.

The Government had set a target of a maximum of 12 per cent positive testing in random checks for drugs. Lewes Prison recorded the highest score at 31.6 per cent but Blantyre was well towards the bottom of the list at 2.3 per cent.