Prison visiting committee reports released under the Freedom of Information Act show jail cutbacks are biting deep, reports Conor Lally.
At Dublin's Mountjoy Prison in 1998 a new era of rehabilitative care for inmates was ushered in. The prison's Connect project, we were told at the time, was the way of the future. Under the scheme the needs of every prisoner were to be identified and sentences managed thereafter according to the needs of the individual prisoner. It was a ground-breaking approach.
If inmates had a drug problem they would be offered detoxification and counselling. If literary skills were an issue, an education programme would be devised. Sex offenders would get treatment. Inmates would be given practical training in trades and crafts; they would be given temporary release to help them rejoin the workforce and on their release would be placed by the prison and Fás in full-time training or employment.
The scheme was piloted in Mountjoy for three years. When the results of the pilot were published in July 2001 they were nothing short of spectacular. The recidivism rate for those who took part in the project was 5 per cent, compared with 70 per cent for the wider prison population. One in three prisoners completing the project secured employment or were placed in training immediately on release.
The Government saw the merits of the scheme and weighed in with a massive investment.
Some €58 million was made available for the scheme's expansion over six years across the prison service. The money was released from the National Development Plan.
In July 2002, when Minister for Justice Michael McDowell launched the scheme in Wheatfield Prison, he described it as "the only way forward in prisoner rehabilitation". It represented "some of the best features in our national life: care for others, social solidarity and the will to succeed and better ourselves".
Now fast-forward almost three years to the present. The prison service is going to through the biggest cost-cutting drive since the formation of the State, and Connect has been abandoned as a result.
McDowell and the prison officers have failed to agree on a deal that would cut by €25 million the prison service's overtime bill, which has peaked at almost €65 million.
Under the deal, prison officers were offered a basic salary of between €48,000 and €70,000 along with a once-off payment of €13,750. In exchange for this they would have been expected to work seven hours' overtime a week.
The offer was hammered out at the Labour Relations Commission and at arbitration in a process that took almost two years. The Prison Officers' Association (POA) recommended their members take the deal. But they ignored this advice and rejected it by a majority of two to one.
The Minister has responded by closing two jails - Fort Mitchel Prison on Spike Island in Co Cork and the Curragh Place of Detention in Co Kildare. Two open prisons - Loughan House in Co Cavan and Shelton Abbey in Co Wicklow - are going to become half-way houses run by care workers rather than prison officers by the autumn.
Legislation for privatising prison escorts is to be published next week. And McDowell has told prison governors that as and from next Tuesday, they will be expected to operate on strict monthly budgets. He insists he is not for turning. His rhetoric has been as strong as his resolve. This has irritated many prison officers.
"I won't be beaten," he has said.
IN THE FACE of this severe pressure the POA next week hosts its annual conference in Castlebar, Co Mayo. Serious bloodletting within the ranks of the POA cannot be ruled out. The national executive says it will gauge the mood and record the views of delegates before deciding how to proceed in the process.
It has refused to rule in or out the possibility of a re-ballot on the pay deal. It has also refused to be drawn on the likelihood of strike action.
However, as the saga plays out in coming weeks and months, budget constraints will bite further in jails. The cutbacks will be felt by inmates and staff alike.
The prison visiting committee reports for last year, obtained by The Irish Times under the Freedom of Information Act, reveal that by the end of 2004, when Connect had become just a memory, many cracks had begun to appear in the prison system.
At St Patrick's Institution, Dublin, which houses offenders aged between 16 and 21 years, cutbacks had forced the closure of workshops, the gym and library.
At Mountjoy Prison in the city, the drama project and evening classes have been discontinued. Workshops have also ceased and as a result of this, the committee notes, "relationships with outside agencies such as Fás, which took years to build up, are now gone because certain standards cannot be met".
At the Dóchas Centre - the women's prison within the Mountjoy complex - there is no psychologist for inmates, many of whom are among the most vulnerable in society. Prisoners are prescribed medication for drug abuse, but are given no counselling.
Cork Prison is packed with 280 inmates, almost twice the 150 it was designed to house. These inmates have no in-cell sanitation. A new block planned to alleviate the overcrowding and the chamber pot-related hygiene issues, has been shelved and the money diverted elsewhere.
At Midlands Prison, in Portlaoise, there is no sex-offender treatment programme, even though most sex offenders who were held at the Curragh Place of Detention were transferred to the Midlands Prison when that jail was closed to save money last year.
Yesterday, after a meeting with the POA in Dublin, McDowell insisted prisoners would not unduly suffer as a result of the cutbacks. He said he had impressed this on prison governors when he met them last Saturday in the city. However, he conceded some prisoner services had been compromised.
"There have been some things, for instance classes and supervised activities and the like which have suffered and, you know, I regret that deeply. But I've said to the governors, I'm not going to allow anybody to take the prisoners hostage and make them suffer for the maintenance of an overtime regime which is not acceptable and not sustainable."