Question to the Ministry of Justice:

To ask the Secretary of State for Justice, how many people were convicted of assaulting a police officer in the last year for which figures are available; and what proportion of those people received a prison sentence.

The Government strongly condemns assaults against police officers. That is why we helped draft legislation which will double the maximum sentence for assaults against them, and other emergency workers, to ensure those who carry out such attacks feel the full force of the law.

Statistics on convictions for assault of a police officer can be found in ‘Experimental statistics – proceedings and outcomes by Home Office offence code (CSV)’ in the annual criminal justice statistics publication at https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/criminal-justice-system-statistics-quarterly-december-2016. The offence code to select is ‘10423 – assault on a constable’. Data is available here for 2015 and 2016, which is the latest currently available.