The New South Wales prison watchdog has urged the Minns government to permanently close sections of a Sydney prison that house inmates with high needs after finding the facilities are “incapable of providing safe and humane conditions”.

The inspector of custodial services released a scathing report on Monday that examined the treatment of inmates in three sections of the government-owned Long Bay Correctional Centre during 2023 and 2024.

The complex, which houses about 1,200 inmates, includes hospital facilities for inmates and support services for elderly inmates.

The watchdog found one section of Long Bay’s hospital facilities to be “modern” and “fit for purpose”.

However, it found a separate section bore “no resemblance to a hospital”, and was being used to house inmates who had been refused bail and were on remand.

The inspector, Fiona Rafter, found failings in another section of Long Bay which houses maximum and minimum security inmates.

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The Metropolitan Special Programs Centre (MSPC) – which still includes infrastructure from when it was built in 1909 – provides support services for aged and frail inmates and inmates with psychical and intellectual disabilities. It also provides intensive programs for sex and violent offenders.

Rafter recommended the government permanently close both units after her report found that the infrastructure was “dilapidated, unsafe, and not fit for purpose” and “incapable of providing safe and humane conditions”.

“The age and condition of MSPC means it simply cannot provide a safe environment for people in custody, particularly those with needs arising from disability, age and frailty and mental illness,” the report said. “This physical environment frustrates good initiatives that aim to support inmate rehabilitation and wellbeing.

“We have no choice but to recommend its closure.”

The report said that four months after the watchdog announced the inspection, the government temporarily closed sections as part of a project to consolidate beds across state-owned prisons.

“Unsurprisingly there was a notable increase in lockdowns due to short staffing after the reopening,” she wrote.

Rafter wrote that the watchdog examined the changes made during the closure, and remained “at a loss to understand the intention of these temporary closures and what, if anything, they achieved.

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“We believe the temporary closures should have been permanent,” she said.

Both units recommended to be permanently closed were found to contain ligature points.

A Guardian Australia investigation found that there had been 10 hanging deaths from two hanging points at Long Bay Correctional Centre between 1995 and 2017, which corrective services said had now been addressed in “several wings at Long Bay” by the installation of mesh screens.

The watchdog also found that staff at Long Bay were not adhering to the correction department’s policies and procedures to appropriately manage transgender and intersex people in custody.

The report noted it was impressed with improvements to meet the needs of inmates with disabilities. However, it found that in the decade since the inspector released its Old and Inside report in 2015, “little has been done to provide more fit for purpose accommodation for the growing number of aged and frail people in custody.

“There is now an urgent need for suitable facilities,” she wrote.

Rafter also wrote that the watchdog found “few improvements” in the intensive programs for violent offenders and sex offenders at MSPC since they were last reviewed in 2020.