Prison officers walked out last August over a staged pay rise

But Gordon Brown faced his first significant backbench rebellion since becoming prime minister, with 35 Labour MPs opposing the plan.

The government said it was "reluctantly compelled" to seek the powers following a walkout by 20,000 prison officers.

MPs voted by 481 to 46 for the measure, which is a government amendment to its own Criminal Justice Bill.

Former Europe minister Keith Vaz and former sports minister Kate Hoey were among the Labour rebels.

Justice Secretary Jack Straw introduced the amendment to allow the government to reintroduce powers to ban strikes by prison officers - if a satisfactory voluntary agreement could not be reached.

'U-turn'

He said it was necessary for public safety, and prisoners' welfare, that prison officers did not strike.

He has been accused of a "humiliating U-turn" by the Conservatives, who say in opposition Labour opposed a previous ban introduced in 1994 - and courted prison officers' votes by promising to repeal it.

In government Labour eventually repealed the law in 2005, replacing it with a voluntary agreement with the POA.

Mr Straw said some professions could not be allowed to strike

But last year the POA, angry at a decision to pay prison officers' pay rises in two stages, gave said it was pulling out of the agreement and staged a surprise walkout across England and Wales.

Mr Straw said the POA had been aware when it signed up to a voluntary agreement that, if it failed, a ban on strikes would come into force.

But several MPs were concerned that Mr Straw's announcement on Monday, that he would seek powers to re-introduce a ban, had been made while negotiations continued.

Labour MP Neil Gerrard said the POA saw it as "holding a gun to their heads" and Labour MP John McDonnell questioned whether it had been a "wise decision" to bring it forward now, as it would "build upon distrust" within the union.

'Most unfortunate'

Another Labour MP, David Winnick, said he could not support the current wording of the plans, as they could be used by "another government" to ban strikes by other emergency workers.

Lib Dem justice spokesman David Heath said the timing was "most unfortunate" when a report from Acas's Ed Sweeney, who has chaired talks between the Prison Service and the POA, had only been just been published.

These are matters of life and liberty and we are being asked to pass them on the nod David Heath Lib Dems

Mr Straw said he would look again at the wording to address MPs' concerns - but said the announcement would not have taken the POA by surprise, as it had known a ban would be reinstated if the voluntary agreement failed.

Conservative justice spokesman Nick Herbert said he was glad Mr Straw had been converted to "Thatcherite legislation". He added that the Tories would back the amendment, as they had introduced the original ban.

'Railroading' claim

Others also queued up to attack the government for "railroading" through other amendments - such as changes to the law on self-defence - which are due to be debated in the Commons later.

Tory Mike Penning said allowing 58 minutes to debate the plans was an "insult to prison officers".

For the Lib Dems, Mr Heath said: "These are matters of life and liberty and we are being asked to pass them on the nod because of a timetable exercise by, apparently, the whips against the interest of the department."