Michael McDowell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank all our witnesses. As somebody who had experience of Ministerial responsibility for the Prison Service, I am convinced of several things. I am convinced that this legislation is necessary and that the prison visiting committees need to be strengthened and reformed. I am also convinced that the chief inspector should be somebody who has been made independent by statute. I do not believe in that context that it is necessary to impose on the chief inspector the obligation imposed on senior civil servants testifying before Oireachtas committees that they should not express an opinion on Government policy. The position would be enhanced by the removal of this aspect.

When I was the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, I remember finding among the papers of my predecessors, and I will be charitable and not name any names, correspondence from a Deputy in the south of the country asking that a student member of his party be appointed to a prison visiting committees as far north as possible. I think there was an exclamation mark beside the request, so therefore I think there was a slight element of jocularity about it. It underlined that prison visiting committees were at that time regarded as a kind of reward for party activists and supporters who could claim expenses. These visiting committees do extremely valuable work. The proposal here regarding the appointment of their memberships is welcome.

As far as I am concerned, it is all very well to talk about a rights-based approach to prisoners, but our present prison infrastructure - and I am dealing now with prisons - is so deficient that prisoner-on-prisoner violence is a serious deprivation of human rights. This requires not simply the appointment of an inspector who will be able to do nothing to stop blades being carried in prisons and retribution being meted out to prisoners in individual cases, but more infrastructure. We need to build Thornton Hall. We must have a proper prison. Good and all as have been the reforms to the governance of Mountjoy Prison undertaken by recent governors since the appalling situation revealed in the Gary Douch report, the prison needs to be closed and replaced.

We cannot have this complacent approach to prisons of the infrastructure being fine and that we are going to look after people's rights and civil liberties and all the rest of it. We must address what is staring us in the face, which is that prisoners are vulnerable to suffering harm from each other and vulnerable in the context of the whole drugs culture about which little enough is done to address. The circumstances in the prison, according to the Constitution and the law, are intended to provide for rehabilitation. The lack of infrastructure means this is greatly compromised. We must build prisons. There are people who think that building prisons is a waste of time. Building a new and proper prison, however, and at least one, and maybe more, to guarantee the rights of prisoners physically, to give them safety from each other and to allow for proper segregation is a human rights' issue that cannot be postponed.

If we do not allow the chief Inspector of Prisons to express views about Government policy when brought before an Oireachtas committee, then, effectively, the role will be neutered in respect of being people's guarantors. It will not affect the Department of Justice that the Inspector of Prisons feels free to do so. I remember that the late Mr. Justice Dermot Kinlen had no difficulty, when he was made Inspector of Prisons, taking lumps out of me as the Minister. It was good that he felt free to do that. It is greatly important that the independence of the inspectorate is guaranteed by the legislation as it progresses.

I am not asking questions. If anyone wants to agree or disagree with me, then please do. I have outlined my views of this matter.