Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, on how many occasions wings of publicly-owned prisons were closed due to insufficient staff levels in December 2017.

The information obtained could only be obtained at disproportionate cost. This Government is fully committed to making our prisons safe and is actively taking the measures necessary to ensure that. We are giving prisons and Governors every possible support. We are boosting the number of prison officers by 2,500; and we are also giving officers the tools they need to manage violent offenders – investing in body-worn cameras, new style handcuffs and piloting PAVA incapacitant spray.