Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 25 October 2012

Public Accounts Committee

Department of Justice and Equality - Review of Allowances

12:45 pm

Mr. Brian Purcell:

The way it actually came into being was that the structure of the way the prisons operated in terms of the tasks and the deployment of staff to various tasks was reviewed for each prison. That task review delivered a structure that enabled the prison system to run with a reduced level. It enabled the system to run with the total number of additional hours based on four bands raising from a zero band right up to 360. I think it was roughly a zero band, 110 hours, 240, 360, or something like that. So the review of the tasks within the prison delivered a structure that enabled the prisons to run with those additional hours so that one was not in a position where one had to rely on overtime to cover the shortfalls.