Mr. Liam Herrick:

As regards the question on special needs and other needs, we are as concerned about the police detention aspect as about the prison detention one. We are particularly taken by the recent report on custody that was produced by the Garda Inspectorate. It addressed many of the issues raised by the Senator, such as the needs of particular groups and the very high level of detention in police custody of people who are there for mental health reasons in the broad sense. It emphasises the point made earlier in respect of the continuum of detention. It gets to the heart of the philosophy behind this international treaty. It covers all places where people are detained, that is, all closed spaces where people need special protection. At a broad level, that is the difficulty we have with the approach taken in the Bill. The approach is quite narrow. It is about prisons plus police detention and, whereas there is an intention to include a wider range of sectors, including mental health and so on, there is very little detail at the moment. Of course, the Government will have the opportunity to specify much more detail as we progress, but there is no stated intention to cover many of the types of facilities that we think should be encompassed here, such as nursing homes, care homes and other facilities that are in what one might call a category of quasi-detention. We would include direct provision in that regard as well. The Senator is absolutely right. Legal distinctions between different legal categories of detention do not fully capture the fact that many people experience a variety of types of institutional care at different stages in their life.