Dublin's Mountjoy Prison could be worth up to €2 billion to the State, it was claimed yesterday.
Announcing that tenders will be sought for the redevelopment of the 20-acre site, Tom Parlon, Minister of State for Finance, said the deal could be one of the most lucrative in the history of the State.
"It could be worth anything between €10 million an acre and €100 million," he said.
"In today's prices it is very difficult to quantify how much the land could be worth. We are also talking about a deal in two years' time."
The Government is planning to sell off the jail and use the money to fund a new prison for 1,000 inmates at Kilsallaghan, north Co Dublin.
Mr Parlon also unveiled the Government's intention to seek tenders for the services contract to redevelop the site.
"The Mountjoy Prison complex in Dublin's north inner city is a location of great cultural and historic importance both to the capital and the country as a whole," he said.
"On behalf of the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform, the Commissioners of Public Works are now charged with creating a new role for the prison site which contributes to the regeneration of that part of Dublin while respecting and enhancing the site's important historic and cultural characteristics."
The OPW is asking consultants to draw up a plan for the site which will include residential, commercial and retail developments, but protect historic monuments in the jail.
The Labour Party justice spokesman, Joe Costello, yesterday criticised the Government for indicating it was unlikely to offer any of the Mountjoy site to the Mater hospital.
"There is a crying need for additional space to allow the proposed development of the Mater hospital to go ahead," he said. "The Mountjoy site is directly across the road from the Mater and would offer an ideal solution to their space problem without costing the State anything in real terms.
"It is also not unreasonable, if Mountjoy is to close, that the local community should benefit in some way. Unfortunately Ministers McDowell and Parlon seem to share the ideological obsession of their leader, Mary Harney, with selling off State lands, regardless of whether there is a case for keeping them in public ownership."