Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

It is always hard to predict because numbers do fluctuate. They go up and down and you have costs you do not expect. We have had issues around netting and restrictive measures put in place to prevent drugs getting into prisons. Some of those have been damaged this year, it has cost millions to restore them and that is not money that could have been predicted or planned for so there is always an element of funding that cannot be planned for but for the vast majority of people, there was no clear expectation that the numbers would increase as quickly as they did. I do not have it to hand but certainly the number of people on remand in the past ten years, specifically those related to domestic and sexual violence offences, has increased significantly, which has added a significant amount of pressure be it in Clover Hill or those particular prisons. The numbers have shot up quite significantly in quite a short space of time, which is why the plan is now in place for 1,100 new places separate from any potential new prison, expansion or new female prison on top of that.