Ciarán Lynch (Cork South Central, Labour)
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Question 162: To ask the Minister for Justice and Equality the average cost of holding a prisoner in custody in 2010, to include all current expenditure by other Government Departments on the provision of services to the prisoner such as teaching, computer maintenance and so on; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [36791/11]

Alan Shatter (Dublin South, Fine Gael)
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The Deputy may wish to note that information on the average cost of an available staffed prison space is contained in the Irish Prison Service Annual Report for 2010 and on the Prison Service's website www.irishprisons.ie.

The average cost of an available staffed prison space during the calendar year 2010 was €70,513 (€77,222 in 2009), a decrease on the 2009 cost of €6,709 or 8.7%. The decrease in average cost is attributed to the following two factors:

a decrease in total costs of €20.7 million

an increase in bed capacity of 97 from 4,106 as at 31st December 2009 to an average bed capacity of for 2010.

Consistent with calculations in previous years, costs which are not under the direct control of the Irish Prison Service were excluded. Therefore, Teachers' salary costs were excluded from this exercise as these costs are not provided for under the Prisons budget allocation. Similarly, capital expenditure, including building/equipment assets and small works, is excluded from the calculations in the interest of facilitating comparison between prison types. The Irish Prison Service does not maintain the information required to calculate the average cost of the provision of services to prisoners provided by other Government Departments.