Nottingham Post: 'Boling cauldron' at HMP Nottingham

A PRISON officer needed 11 stitches after being hit on the head with a wooden table leg by a prisoner.

The attack, on Sunday January 8 in HMP Nottingham, is one of eight assaults on staff at the prison since the start of the year.

Other attacks have left prison officers bruised, shaken, and in one case with a broken jaw.

The situation in the Perry Road prison has been described by an anonymous insider as a "boiling cauldron", and there have been a total of eight assaults since January 1. In 2011 there were 18 assaults.

Prison governor Peter Wright said: "We have had a number of assaults since the start of the year and we take them all extremely seriously.

"We are looking into ways of making sure similar incidents do not happen again, and I feel I should take this opportunity to thank all my staff for responding so bravely to the attacks. This was a nasty attack."

Mr Wright said that during the more serious attack the prisoner jumped on to the safety netting stretched across the different levels of the prison and refused to get down.

"He managed to get on to the safety netting and we are looking at ways to making sure that this sort of behaviour does not happen again," he said.

The prison is currently trying to save £700,000 in financial cutbacks, but Mr Wright has assured the public that saving this cash will not affect the front line.

He said: "We are trying to save this money as part of the cutbacks but I should reassure the public that the safety of the prison will not be compromised. And we will not cut back on the front line of prison officers."

But the insider, who does not want to be named for fear of being sacked, said prison officers are expecting front-line redundancies.

They said: "Staff have serious concerns with regards the number of assaults.

"This is compounded with the governor trying to force through a £700,000 saving and job cuts from front-line staff which will result in restrictions to the regime as we have been running the jail short-staffed and having to pay overtime to run the jail as it is.

"This further reduction will only result in more volatility from prisoners as their access to phone calls and showers will be reduced due to low staffing levels."