ATTACKS ON JAIL GUARDS UP 30% Give us more staff’ plea as drug-fuelled violence soars in prison
ASSAULTS on prison officers soared by almost 30 per cent last year as violence spiralled out of control, shock figures reveal.
The number of everyday attacks on guards just doing their jobs hit a high of 6,430, compared to 4,963 in 2015.
And the toll of more serious incidents involving broken bones, stabbings and scaldings with boiling water rose to 761.
That alone was a 22 per cent increase on the 625 recorded the year before, according to Ministry of Justice figures.
Glyn Travis of the prison officers’ as- sociation said: “The brutality of attacks on staff is shocking.
“Violence is out of control, fuelled by so- called l egal high drugs and compounded by too few staff.
“We need more officers and for all to be paid a wage that reflects the demands of the job.”
The Sunday People has learned that in one recent flare-up an officer had to go to hospital after being assaulted with his own baton.
He intervened during an incident at Onley prison in Warwickshire when an inmate was suspected of smuggling contraband.
The prisoner went berserk and grabbed the officer’s extendable baton, cracking him across the head. The guard was treated in hospital for head and eye injuries and is now off sick.
The rise in assaults on staff comes amid an overall surge in prison violence.
MoJ figures show general assaults behind bars, including inmate-on-inmate, were up to 25,049 in the 12 months to September 2016. This represented a 22 per cent rise on the total of 20,518 assaults recorded in 2015.
The statistics also revealed a record rise in suicides behind bars to 119. That was 29 more than the previous year – and the highest since records began in 1978.
There were also a record number of 37,784 self-harm incidents.
Justice Secretary Liz Truss said prisons faced “long-standing issues that will not be resolved in weeks”.
Last year thousands of staff walked out in protest over health and safety concerns, amid claims the prison system was “in meltdown” because of overcrowding and employee shortages.
A number of serious disturbances also erupted in jails across the country.