Home Secretary Priti Patel said earlier on Wednesday that a coding problem led to the accidental deletion of up to 400,000 records from British police databases but specialists were working to recover the information from different systems.

“Of course it is outrageous that any data should have been lost but at the moment … we’re trying to retrieve that data,” Johnson told parliament, adding that the Home Office (interior ministry) hoped to restore the deleted information.

“We don’t know how many cases might be frustrated as a result of what has happened,” Johnson said.

Johnson said 213,000 offence records, 175,000 arrest records and 15,000 personal records were being investigated as a result of the computer issues.

The leader of the opposition Labour Party, Keir Starmer, quoted police chiefs as saying 403,000 records from the Police National Computer might have been deleted, as well as 26,000 DNA records and 30,000 fingerprint records from other databases been deleted.

The data included that from criminals convicted of serious offences while live police investigations had been affected and included DNA marked for indefinite retention following serious offences, Starmer told parliament.

The Home Office said in a statement that data had been lost due to a human error during “routine housekeeping”.

The Police National Computer is a vast database used by police and law enforcement agencies across the UK. It includes data on those convicted, wanted people, missing people, vehicles, and stolen goods.