CASTLEREA will be getting the "kind of prison it expected" before last year's Government cuts appeared to halt the project, the Minister for Justice made clear yesterday.
The first group of prisoners to be transferred - about 25 republicans from Poitlaoise - are to be accommodated at Castlerea within three months, Ms Owen said. But this would be only the first phase of the development, she emphasised during a visit to the Co Roscommon town.
Her assurances to residents appeared to assuage fears that the prison, which will have a major impact on the local economy, was being scaled down, as some local representatives had claimed after the Minister announced the Government's measures to counter crime last week.
Ms Owen's assurances are being seen as a definite commitment to the development of the secure prison in the grounds of the former psychiatric hospital in Castlerea.
The original project, comprising a £20 million prison for about 150 prisoners, was deferred last summer during budget cuts, but appears now to have been reinstated following a series of embarrassments for the Government over the early temporary release of offenders.
Speaking to business people and local representatives, the Minister would not commit herself to exact numbers, but agreed that, when completed, the prison would be "in the ball park" of about 150 prisoners in a complex costing about £20 million.
Mr Kieran Madigan, chairman of the Castlerea Development Co operative Society, welcomed the assurances. Local people had been devastated by last year's announcement that the project had been deferred, he said, but the Minister had now given a "strong commitment" to the reinstatement of the prison.
The IRA prisoners detained in Portlaoise stated last week that they would agree in principle to be accommodated in Castlerea. Removing the paramilitary prisoners from Portlaoise will free some 85 additional cells there for other serious offenders.