‘I thought I was going to die’: The epidemic of violence against prison officers
Violence against prison officers has soared since the pandemic with 23 attacks a day recorded last year across England and Wales.
A new report by the Community trade union, exclusively seen by Sky News, warns that without “major, generational reform… the epidemic of violence will only get worse”.
It is calling for all political parties to commit to a national strategy to reduce attacks on staff ahead of the next general election.
Political correspondent Amanda Akass has been speaking to one prison officer who suffered catastrophic injuries during an attack at work.
When Martin Geddes was ambushed by an inmate who stole his baton and beat him around the head – he thought he was going to die.
“He sucker punched me, grabbed me, pulled me into the cell and got hold of my baton. And that’s the last thing I remember until I came round with the cell full of officers and my friend thought my throat had been cut, because there was that much blood.
Mr Geddes still suffers from headaches three years on
“I suffered a ten inch laceration to the back of my head requiring ten staples, and multiple other baton injuries to my head and body.” His attacker was convicted and sentenced to an indefinite hospital order.
Three years on, Martin still suffers from searing headaches- and says it’s had a catastrophic impact on his mental health.
“I was having flashbacks – for at least 12 months, before I had therapy.
“The flashbacks were 40 or 50 a day of the last image I remember, the inmate holding my baton fully extended above my head. I had suicidal thoughts. If it hadn’t been for my partner Alison I would have taken my own life. I just couldn’t cope.
“It was a job I loved doing but I would never go back. I’ve had to resign. I just don’t feel safe on the landing anymore.”
He received a laceration to the back of his head
The number of prison officers facing attacks at work – across both public and private prisons – is rising rapidly. At the current rate it’s soon set to overtake the record numbers from just before the pandemic in 2018-19.
The latest government figures released in January show there were 8,516 assaults on prison officers in England and Wales over the 12 months to September 2023, an increase of 16% on the previous year – which works out at 23 attacks a day. Of those attacks 765 were categorised as serious. Attacks in women’s prisons meanwhile are at their highest ever level, with 785 during that same period.
The Community trade union, which represents thousands of staff at private prisons, has today published a report, exclusively seen by Sky News, which claims that without “major, generational reform of the sector, chronic overcrowding and the epidemic of violence against prison staff will only get worse”.
Co-author Kate Dearden, Community’s head of research, policy and politics, is calling for all political parties to commit to the development of a national plan to reduce assaults on staff in their manifestos ahead of the next general election.
Mr Geddes says he suffered flashbacks to the incident for over a year
She wants to see higher minimum staffing levels, swifter, stronger punishments for offenders, greater mental health support for those affected, and better pay to improve staffing levels. The union is also calling for measures to reduce overcrowding, such as a greater use of community sentences and electronic tagging.
She said: “It’s not right that people should have to risk their lives just going to work, with their families worried about if they’re going to come home.
“Action has to be taken to prevent and stamp out these assaults. It’s clear that we need a complete overhaul of our justice system to make sure that happens.”
In November, the prison population in England and Wales was 87,930, against an operational capacity of 88,924. More than 60% of prisons are officially overcrowded and holding more inmates than they are certified to.
Kate Dearden, Community’s head of research, policy and politics
While the government is committed to provide 20,000 new places by the mid 2020s, minister Edward Argar informed the Justice Select Committee this week that only 8,500 are set to be ready by May 2025. He blamed the delays on problems securing planning permission for new prisons.
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In their Prisons Performance Tracker for 2023, the Institute for Government concluded that while the number of prison officers had grown by 1.3% over the past year, total staff numbers were still 10% lower than in 2010, and retention is “poor”.
A Ministry of Justice spokesperson said: “The overall rate of assaults on our hardworking prison staff is 10% lower than prior to the pandemic but violence is never tolerated which is why we increased the maximum penalty for assaulting prison officers.
“We have also invested £100m in tough security measures including X-ray body scanners to clamp down on the contraband that fuels violence behind bars.”
The UK-US trade deal has been signed and is “done”, US President Donald Trump has said as he met Sir Keir Starmer at the G7 summit.
The US president told reporters in Canada: “We signed it, and it’s done. It’s a fair deal for both. It’ll produce a lot of jobs, a lot of income.”
Sir Keir said the document “implements” the deal to cut tariffs on cars and aerospace, describing it as a “really important agreement”.
“So this is a very good day for both of our countries – a real sign of strength,” the prime minister added.
Mr Trump added that the UK was “very well protected” against any future tariffs, saying: “You know why? Because I like them”.
However, he did not say whether levies on British steel exports to the US would be set to 0%, saying “we’re gonna let you have that information in a little while”.
Mr Trump also praised Sir Keir as a “great” prime minister, adding: “We’ve been talking about this deal for six years, and he’s done what they haven’t been able to do.”
He added: “We’re very longtime partners and allies and friends and we’ve become friends in a short period of time.
“He’s slightly more liberal than me to put it mildly… but we get along.”
Sir Keir added that “we make it work”.
As the pair exited a mountain lodge in the Canadian Rockies where the summit is being held, Mr Trump held up a physical copy of the trade agreement to show reporters.
Several leaves of paper fell from the binding, and Sir Keir quickly stooped to pick them up, saying: “A very important document.”
Sir Keir Starmer picks up paper from the UK-US trade deal after Donald Trump dropped it at the G7 summit. Pic: Reuters
The US president also appeared to mistakenly refer to a “trade agreement with the European Union” at one point as he stood alongside the British prime minister.
Mr Trump announced his “Liberation Day” tariffs on countries in April. At the time, he announced 10% “reciprocal” rates on all UK exports – as well as separately announced 25% levies on cars and steel.
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In a joint televised phone call in May, Sir Keir and Mr Trump announced the UK and US had agreed on a trade deal – but added the details were being finalised.
Ahead of the G7 summit, the prime minister said he would meet Mr Trump for “one-on-one” talks, and added the agreement “really matters for the vital sectors that are safeguarded under our deal, and we’ve got to implement that”.
Whitehall officials tried to convince Michael Gove to go to court to cover up the grooming scandal in 2011, Sky News can reveal.
Dominic Cummings, who was working for Lord Gove at the time, has told Sky News that officials in the Department for Education (DfE) wanted to help efforts by Rotherham Council to stop a national newspaper from exposing the scandal.
In an interview with Sky News, Mr Cummings said that officials wanted a “total cover-up”.
Politics latest: Grooming gangs findings unveiled
The revelation shines a light on the institutional reluctance of some key officials in central government to publicly highlight the grooming gang scandal.
In 2011, Rotherham Council approached the Department for Education asking for help following inquiries by The Times. The paper’s then chief reporter, the late Andrew Norfolk, was asking about sexual abuse and trafficking of children in Rotherham.
The council went to Lord Gove’s Department for Education for help. Officials considered the request and then recommended to Lord Gove’s office that the minister back a judicial review which might, if successful, stop The Times publishing the story.
Lord Gove rejected the request on the advice of Mr Cummings. Sources have independently confirmed Mr Cummings’ account.
Education Secretary Michael Gove in 2011. Pic: PA
Mr Cummings told Sky News: “Officials came to me in the Department of Education and said: ‘There’s this Times journalist who wants to write the story about these gangs. The local authority wants to judicially review it and stop The Times publishing the story’.
“So I went to Michael Gove and said: ‘This council is trying to actually stop this and they’re going to use judicial review. You should tell the council that far from siding with the council to stop The Times you will write to the judge and hand over a whole bunch of documents and actually blow up the council’s JR (judicial review).’
“Some officials wanted a total cover-up and were on the side of the council…
“They wanted to help the local council do the cover-up and stop The Times’ reporting, but other officials, including in the DfE private office, said this is completely outrageous and we should blow it up. Gove did, the judicial review got blown up, Norfolk stories ran.”
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Grooming gangs victim speaks out
The judicial review wanted by officials would have asked a judge to decide about the lawfulness of The Times’ publication plans and the consequences that would flow from this information entering the public domain.
A second source told Sky News that the advice from officials was to side with Rotherham Council and its attempts to stop publication of details it did not want in the public domain.
One of the motivations cited for stopping publication would be to prevent the identities of abused children entering the public domain.
There was also a fear that publication could set back the existing attempts to halt the scandal, although incidents of abuse continued for many years after these cases.
Sources suggested that there is also a natural risk aversion amongst officials to publicity of this sort.
Read more on grooming gangs:
What we do and don’t know from the data
A timeline of the scandal
Mr Cummings, who ran the Vote Leave Brexit campaign and was Boris Johnson’s right-hand man in Downing Street, has long pushed for a national inquiry into grooming gangs to expose failures at the heart of government.
He said the inquiry, announced today, “will be a total s**tshow for Whitehall because it will reveal how much Whitehall worked to try and cover up the whole thing.”
He also described Mr Johnson, with whom he has a long-standing animus, as a “moron’ for saying that money spent on inquiries into historic child sexual abuse had been “spaffed up the wall”.
Asked by Sky News political correspondent Liz Bates why he had not pushed for a public inquiry himself when he worked in Number 10 in 2019-20, Mr Cummings said Brexit and then COVID had taken precedence.
“There are a million things that I wanted to do but in 2019 we were dealing with the constitutional crisis,” he said.
The Department for Education and Rotherham Council have been approached for comment.
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