Mr. Mark Kelly:

I thank the Leas-Chathaoirleach, Senators and Deputies for the opportunity to share with them the views of the Office of the Inspector of Prisons on the general scheme of the inspection of places of detention Bill. I am the chief inspector of prisons and I am accompanied on my left by Dr. Ciara O'Connell, who is a senior inspector. Once enacted, the provisions in this general scheme will pave the way for Ireland to ratify the Optional Protocol to the UN Convention against Torture, OPCAT, and to designate national preventive mechanisms to monitor conditions of detention. We welcome the very clear legislative intent to transform our office into an inspectorate of places of detention and to designate it the national preventive mechanism for the criminal justice sector. That would mean we would have responsibility for monitoring not only prisons but also Garda Síochána stations and other places of detention. I emphasise that, in future, all our inspection activity will be carried out in our national preventive mechanism, NPM, capacity. The approach we have taken in our written submission to the committee is to "benchmark" the proposals in the general scheme against the internationally recognised requirements of OPCAT.

There is much to be welcomed in the general scheme. Nevertheless, we have shared with the committee our reservations about a number of the heads that do not seem to respect the cardinal principle that bodies designated as national preventive mechanisms must have functional independence from Departments and a full range of appropriate powers. In our full submission, we emphasise three key areas where we consider that the general scheme may require amendment. First are the guarantees of functional independence of the inspectorate and other national preventive mechanisms, which, in our view, are deficient. Second are the proposed functions of the inspectorate. Third, we think there are certain supplementary provisions that should be included in the legislation but which are not currently to be found in it.

I would be very happy, as would my colleague, Dr. O'Connell, to go into further detail on all these matters in response to questions from committee members.