Richard Drax
Main Page: Richard Drax (Conservative - South Dorset)Department Debates - View all Richard Drax's debates with the Ministry of Justice
(5 years, 8 months ago)
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Rory Stewart
The fundamental factor that triggered the change at Birmingham was that in December 2016 one of the prison officers managed to lose their keys, which led to nearly 200 prisoners being unlocked and a riot in the prison. G4S had been improving the prison over the previous three years, but that event really knocked the bottom out of it. It had a devastating effect on morale, and as the hon. Lady implied, it led to a lot of experienced staff leaving the prison. Looking back over that period, we can see that, although the chief inspector of prisons and the Government had hoped that things were beginning to improve during 2017, that turned out in the end to be a false promise, and we are still recovering from the blow of that December 2016 event.
Richard Drax (South Dorset) (Con)
I have huge confidence in my hon. Friend the Minister, but I do not have confidence that the prison officers that the Government employ will stay on. The facts speak for themselves. I agree entirely with the hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant); many of my local prison officers, along with, I am sure, many across the prison estate, are concerned that the proper discipline, protection and all the other things are not in place to look after them. Will my hon. Friend assure the House that he will look into the matter and make sure that if, for example, a prison officer is assaulted, the assaulter is jailed for a much longer period?
Rory Stewart
That is absolutely the right challenge. The hon. Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) has introduced a private Member’s Bill that will double the maximum sentence available for assaulting prison officers. But it is not enough just to double the maximum sentence. We need to make sure that the police and the Crown Prosecution Service work together to bring prosecutions forward. There are still today too many incidents of prison officers being assaulted. They are hard-working, serious and professional public servants with a very challenging working life. We owe them a duty of care, and we must prosecute people who assault them.