PRISON officers want the right to strike, POA general secretary Steve Gillan insisted today as the union’s members discussed the ban on them taking industrial action.

The ban has led to the creation of the Health and Safety Protocol in 2019 to ensure that members can approach the union with their concerns without facing legal action under section 127 of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act.

Speakers at the meeting highlighted the problems arising from the legislation, noting that they can face prosecution for taking industrial action “even when the words [to do so] are not used” in correspondence with members.

Speaking at a fringe meeting at the POA annual conference in Eastbourne, Mr Gillan said: “We've been around a long time and we know that every time you sneeze in the wrong direction, they will say: ‘You’re breaching section 127’.”

He pledged to tell shadow prisons minister Ruth Cadbury, who is due to speak at the conference tomorrow, that “we want our right to strike back.”

Mr Gillan insisted: “It won’t cost them a single penny to restore our trade union rights.

“They’ve restored it in Scotland and the sky hasn’t caved in and so they can restore it [in England and Wales] too.”

He vowed that the union would hold Labour’s “feet to the fire” over its New Deal for Workers, which he praised “unless it is diluted by the next general election.

“But that’s why campaigns are really important,” he said, highlighting the historic 1984-85 miners’ strike.

“We must continue campaigning. Trade unions are not the movement of struggle for nothing.”