Cloverhill prison conditions 'critical' as only three mattresses left - Prison Service

Ken Foxe

Prisons were operating at such extreme levels of overcrowding that senior officials warned they might not be able to take any new inmates and would struggle to produce prisoners at court.

In a stark warning, the Director General of the Irish Prison Service said the country’s main remand prison was at 125 per cent capacity and only had room for three more people.

Caron McCaffrey said once those three mattresses were used, there would be “no further secure accommodation” available at Cloverhill Prison.

Ms McCaffrey said six jails were operating at capacities of between 123 and 154 per cent of their intended capacity.

She said there was an “unprecedented risk” in the penal system because of the worsening overcrowding crisis.

A letter to the Department of Justice said: “It is likely our ability to continue to receive committals out of hours, our ability to produce ever increasing numbers of prisoners to court and our ability to accommodate prisoners once we run out of secure cell accommodation will be impacted in the coming weeks and months.”

The Director General said the situation was now “critical” and asked for an urgent meeting of a taskforce on overcrowding.

At the time the letter was sent last October, there were 5,581 people in custody, 20 per cent above designed capacity.

McCaffrey wrote: “Certain prisons are now under extreme duress as a result of operating at higher-than-average capacity.”

She forwarded a paper from the UK on how they had managed a similar overcrowding crisis, in particular around setting “operational capacity limits.”

“A review by the Department of the governance structures in place to support the management and mitigation of risk across the sector is, in my view, now critical,” the letter concluded.

A response from Oonagh McPhillips, the Secretary General of the Department of Justice, said they were “acutely aware of the difficult circumstances.”

She wrote: “I can assure you that the Department will support you in whatever way possible during this very challenging period.”

McPhillips said the National Development Plan included prison investment and that increased funding had been given to the Probation Service to support the penal system.

Her letter in early November said: “Once again, I want to put on record my appreciation of the work being done by you and your staff in very challenging circumstances.”

A copy of the paper from the UK on how they managed their overcrowding crisis said rising prison numbers had stemmed in part from a political narrative around being “tough on crime.”

There had been a decline in community sentences, more recalls to prison while on temporary release, and overuse of short custodial sentences.

It said operational ‘red lines’ had been set on how many people a prison could safely house, with an understanding that these would not be breached.

The presentation said: “It assists in managing pressures to ensure the safety of staff and prisoners, this includes restricting crowding to limits it has assessed as safe.”

The paper also said around 500 places were reserved for emergency access in case of an unplanned loss of capacity due to fire or water outages.

Asked about the records, which were released under FOI, the Irish Prison Service said they had nothing further to add to the contents.