Charlie O'Connor (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail)
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Question 129: To ask the Minister for Justice and Law Reform his plans for increasing the use of restorative justice; his assessment of the content of the final report from the Restorative Justice Commission; the limitations of the restorative justice model; the potential for the use of restorative justice across the Irish criminal justice system; the timescales involved; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [44474/10]

Dermot Ahern (Louth, Fianna Fail)
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My Department has now examined the report on Restorative Justice provided to me by the National Commission. On foot of that examination, I am pleased to inform the Deputy and the House that the Probation Service will be introducing a scheme before the end of this year to test a range of restorative interventions for adult offenders based on the recommendations contained in the report. This will enable my Department to evaluate what role such interventions as recommended in the report might play having regard to overall effectiveness, potential, and value for money considerations.

My Department, through the Probation Service, already funds two restorative justice projects, one based in Nenagh and a second in Tallaght. The scheme will involve an expansion of these two projects. The Nenagh Community Reparation project will be extended to Limerick and Tipperary while the Tallaght based Restorative Justice Service will be extended to the Criminal Courts of Justice. The objective of the scheme is to build the foundation for the implementation of a robust restorative justice model of practice providing an alternative to a prison sentence of less than 12 months duration. This will test the model's ability to manage up to 100 adult offenders by Community Reparation and up to 300 by the Restorative Justice Service. The model will involve the use of community and volunteer resources.

The Probation Service will monitor, oversee, and evaluate the implementation of the scheme and will provide a report on the effectiveness and value for money of the model after a 12 month operational period. The Deputy can be assured that my focus is to encourage the use, to the greatest extent possible, of the menu of non-custodial options available to the courts. I believe the restorative justice concept has a place in that range of available options.