Shrewsbury MP Daniel Kawczynski in calls for publicly-run prisons

Mr Kawczynski challenged prisons minister Rory Stewart about prison officer numbers during a debate in the Commons.

He said he was concerned about a recent spate of attacks on prison officers, and asked Mr Stewart what steps he was taking to improve their safety.

Mr Kawczynski said he would continue to press the minister about the subject after he failed to fully answer his question about prison officer numbers.

Speaking after the debate, Mr Kawczynski said that while as a Conservative his natural instinct was to support private business, he did not feel this should extend to the prison service.

"While I'm a Conservative, and I'm normally instinctively behind the private sector, I do think the prison service is something that should be done by the state," he said.

"I would need a great deal of convincing this sort of work should be going to the private sector, and will be asking questions about the performance of private prisons.

"I'm all in favour of the privatisation of things like national airlines and telecommunications, but I think when it comes to prisons, the state has a duty of care and responsibility."

During the session in the Commons on Tuesday, Mr Kawczynski asked Mr Stewart what progress had been made on improving safety for prison officers.

Mr Stewart replied that protecting prison officers was vital to having safe prisons.

Assailants

He said: "In order to do this, we have doubled the maximum sentence for assaulting a prison officer, we are introducing body-worn cameras, and we are ensuring, through the training and support we provide for prison officers and the work we do on drugs, that we keep our prisons safe."

Mr Stewart also said a spray which incapacitated assailants during violent incidents was also being introduced.

Kawczynski replied that the number of prison officers was also crucial to their safety, and asked how many prison officers were employed at present, and what plans did he have to increase the number over the next 12 months.

Mr Stewart replied that the service had taken on an extra 4,300 prison officers, taking the number to the highest level since 2012.

But Mr Kawczynski told the Shropshire Star afterwards: "He claims there are more prison officers now than at any time since 2012, but I noticed he didn't tell me how many prison officers there actually are.

"I'm calling for a clear understanding of what the optimum number of prison officers should be, given that the prison population has grown considerably.

"We have heard some quite shocking stories of prison officers being attacked, and we must be doing all we can to support these very important professionals who do a very important job in keeping us all safe."

Following a question from Labour MP David Hanson, Mr Stewart conceded that the number of prison officers was still lower than it was in 2010.

He admitted: "There was a reduction from 2010 to 2012, but we have now turned that around, with the 4,300 extra officers, meaning we can now roll out the key worker programme, which is central, as it means we have the ratios we need to have one prison officer allied with four prisoners to make sure we deliver the work on rehabilitation."

Catherine West, Labour MP for Hornsey and Wood Green called for the Government to improve 'poverty pay' of prison officers.

Mr Steward said the Government was looking at that, and the public sector pay review body was currently gathering evidence on the situation.

"We owe a huge debt of obligation to our prison officers and we have to think about their salaries," he said.

"We also have to balance that with making sure our resources go into improving the physical fabric of these buildings and having the right security infrastructure and the right programming in place.

"Looking at the resources as a whole, we think we have got the balance right, but we will listen to the public sector pay review body."