Demand for answers over 'riot' at Oakwood Prison

Sadiq Khan is demanding answers concerning HMP Oakwood following allegations by a prison officer who said he saw the scale of violence first hand.

The prison near Wolverhampton has been beset by problems including rooftop protests by inmates with accusations that the £150million superjail is understaffed with some wings being left with no-one to supervise the inmates.

Ambulances have been called there almost once a day over the past year, twice as much as any other prison.

The prison was recently branded as a 'dangerous and unsafe' place to work by the Prison Officers Association, which urged the Government to take control of the 1,600-inmate South Staffordshire prison, which is run by private company G4S.

The whistleblowing prison officer, speaking on condition of anonymity, said that prisoners know how to cause problems for officers, who he claims are not properly trained and have come from 'stacking shelves or working in McDonalds'.

He said: "There are no nets to catch prisoners if they fall off the higher levels, so as soon as they put their legs over the edge the whole wing has to go into lock down. The inmates aren't stupid. They know the times of the shift changes so they would hang over the edge just before a change of shift.

"That means no-one would be able to leave so the officers would have to go home late."

Mr Khan said attempts to play down the scale of the incident this month were aimed at sparing the embarrassment of Justice Secretary Chris Grayling, who has publicly praised Oakwood and called it a blueprint for the future.

He said: "More and more evidence is coming to light that what happened in Oakwood Prison in early January was a full-scale riot. The Government has tried to downplay the incident, but only to spare the embarrassment of Chris Grayling who said Oakwood was his favourite prison.

"But the public have a right to know what went on that night. Millions of pounds of taxpayers' money was spent on building a state of the art prison, and is paid to G4S to punish and reform prisoners."

Jerry Petherick, director of custodial and detention services at G4S, said: "I have made it clear this was a significant event and of its type in the spectrum of such events it was at the lower end of that spectrum. We have always acknowledged that it was resolved by intervention and using tactics for which we are trained.

"It was reported at the time and subsequently in the correct way.

"A small number of prisoners were actively involved in the disturbance and they had to be restrained. For a period of time that wing was occupied by prisoners, that wing was brought into full operation within 10 days and some of that delay was because we were waiting for new supplies."

Mr Petherick said that prisoners had taken over the wing for 'a number of hours' adding: "We accumulated the necessary resources to respond to the incident and to enter and intervene in a safe and controlled manner as we are trained to do both in the public and private sector."