Mr. Eoin Carroll:

On the ideology question, I am not a prison abolitionist because, unfortunately, we have not reached a situation where we can respond in a better way. I would like to think that in the future we should be able to respond in a more therapeutic way. However, prison is a damaging experience for people and the numbers being sent to prison need to be limited. Ideologically, whether one is on the left or the right, having smaller prisons works. If we can keep reducing prisoner numbers, it will cost less. If more open prisons can be provided, it will cost considerably less. The State and institutions have had serious failures in the past trying to assess whether somebody is bad or not. I am a believer in the principle of just desserts which is enshrined in our legislation. It is primarily used as a mitigating concept whereby somebody receives a punishment that is just sufficient or just deserving. It is a principle of proportionality.

With regard to picking a number, if I work off the report the committee's predecessor produced in 2013, it would be approximately 2,900. If I use the report of former Deputy, Jim Higgins, it would be between 2,500 and 2,700. When we want to move from the extreme right or the extreme left to the middle - it happens with everything - my statement seems more dramatic now than when if it was said in 2000 but I am recommending nothing different from what was being recommended then. It seems like I am suggesting something dramatic. This is the safest way to pick a number. For example, the management of offenders policy document in 1995 sought to increase prison cell numbers to eliminate overcrowding but it, ultimately, led to an increase in the prison population. That is why a fixed institution number would overcome that.

With regard to prison architecture, our organisation put in a request to see a plan for Cork Prison and we were refused. I know someone who put in a request for the plan to assess the size of facilities for work and training and education. That person had to go through freedom of information legislation to obtain the data. My understanding is that Cork Prison has a smaller educational facility than the previous prison.

We have advocated for the principle of one person, one cell. I spoke to the POA representatives before attending the meeting and they say it is now part of their campaign. The director general and the Prison Service have, in fairness, said that is their aspiration. They have also said that just because Cork Prison has two-person cells that does not mean they will be used as such. However, the present circumstances have answered that question.

I would be nervous about making comments about the Judiciary. My background is in social science and I am not a legal person. However, we need to find out why judges are sending people to prison for longer and why more people are being sent to prison. As Deputy Chambers said, there is no correlation between crime rates and prison numbers. As soon as we can get our heads around that, we can start to reduce prison numbers and tinker with sentencing practices. The IPRT hopes for the inclusion of text in legislation along the lines of the phase,"Prison as a measure of last resort". Judges have to justify custodial sentences now but the more that text can become part of the train of thought of our Judiciary, the better.

On costs, all the recommendations should reduce the amount being spent on prison.

For example, if we were to decide to send 800 fewer people to prison, we could seek to shrink prisons and bring them down to a size below the 300 mark, which would be seen as an international maximum or minimum figure. The Whitaker report was also seeking to create smaller communities of no more than 100 prisoners.

Ireland has been innovative with prisons, an approach largely driven by the Office of Public Works in the building of Wheatfield Prison and, more recently, the Dóchas Centre. There has been innovation, but there has also been a default back to earlier prison models in the form of Cork Prison and also the extension at Wheatfield Prison.