Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Nicholas Dakin and Jack Rankin(4 days, 5 hours ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Jack Rankin (Windsor) (Con)
Personal protective equipment is now worn in all kinds of jobs where people may have to deal with dangerous situations. As Professor Acheson has said, it is
“staggering that frontline police staff working in conditions of far greater peril…are not issued with stab vests capable of stopping an attack with a bladed weapon.”
We should all be ensuring that our prison officers come home safe to their loved ones. Unions have called for this measure, and I can assure the Minister that they have the full support of those on the Opposition side of the House. Will he act—not in two months or six months, but now—to protect prison officers before it is too late?
Sir Nicholas Dakin
That is part of the review that has been announced. My right hon. Friend the Lord Chancellor is meeting the Prison Officers Association tomorrow. These things need to be done rightly and properly, and that is what will happen with this Government.
Jack Rankin
I thank the Minister for his answer, but I suggest that this is something we should just get on with—it is common sense. There is a more fundamental issue. Perhaps I can invite the Minister to provide his assessment of the relative threats provided by different ideological extremists in prisons, which may be fuelling such violence. Islamist terror suspects make up the vast majority of MI5’s caseload. Do they also make up the majority of radicalising criminals in our prison estate?
Sir Nicholas Dakin
The hon. Gentleman urges us to get on with it. By my reckoning, the Conservative party had 14 years to get on with it. We are getting on with it. We set up the snap review straightaway. [Interruption.] “It’s not party political,” he says. Well, people might judge that for themselves by listening to the sort of questioning we have had today.