Gay Mitchell (Dublin South Central, Fine Gael)

I am pleased to have the opportunity to speak on this Bill. I thank my colleague, Deputy O'Dowd, who mentioned some of the points I made when I published my Private Members' Bill last November. Following a European Court of Justice ruling, I published a Private Members' Bill to give votes to prisoners which was entitled the Electoral (Amendment) (Prisoners' Franchise) Bill 2005. I, therefore, welcome moves by the Government to take on board aspects of my Bill.

This part of the Bill and my Private Members' Bill are not about being soft on criminals. Fine Gael strongly believes that people have rights and responsibilities. That is one of the cornerstones of the Christian Democrat Movement in Europe. People not only have rights but they also have responsibilities. It is time to stop recycling prisoners as if they were some sort of commodity and creating an environment in which prisoners have rights but no responsibilities, which takes from their dignity. That was the essential point I wished to make when I published my Bill.

For the rest of us, one of our public duties is to vote, so we should start the process of prison reform by requiring prisoners to start the process of reintegration into a free society from day one by taking their share of public responsibility and duty. Including them on the register of electors would allow them to do that.

I found it extraordinary, when I tabled a parliamentary question earlier this year asking the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform the rate of recidivism among prisoners, that the reply I received was that the Department did not know but it had set up a study presumably as a result of my question. If we do not know the rate of recidivism, how can we take seriously any talk of prisoner reform? How can we measure the success or failure of reform if we do not have such a basic statistic?

Some 75% of prisoners in Mountjoy Prison come from five identifiable areas of Dublin. The House will know that more wealthy suburbs do not appear on this list. Mr. Justice Kinlen, the Inspector of Prisons and Places of Detention, has repeatedly reported on the dreadful standards in our prisons. The ministerial task force on drugs, of which I was a member, recommended on my proposal that Mountjoy Prison be closed. I remember it was greeted with a certain amount of disbelief and derision at the time but it was the ministerial recommendation. I encountered resistance to that proposal but I am glad that ten years later, it is now a real prospect.

I wish to make one other comment on prisons. Do we ever wonder why we now have such a high rate of suicide? I consider that, in part, it is because of the absence of mercy in society. That is a contributing factor. We are all into condemnation and are always condemning others, whether by way of radio programmes, tribunals, courts or parliament. Condemnation has become the norm and very often that norm is not tempered by mercy. This is causing a certain hopelessness in society. We all have our shortcomings; none of us is a saint. Every one of us depends, to some extent, on people pardoning our shortcomings. We need to inform ourselves of that in the way we treat prisoners.

I am not a bleeding heart. I have no time for criminal activity or bullying which is often what criminal activity amounts to. However, where a person makes a real effort to reform, we should meet him or her half way and be informed in our approach by the quality of mercy. We are not here as economists but as politicians. Many will ask where in the world prisoner reform works. Almost hopelessly, that question will be thrown out. We are not elected and paid to merely ask questions. We are elected and paid to find solutions. In an Ireland with unprecedented wealth, we should strive to make the Irish prison system an international model for others to follow. In that regard, extending the right to vote to prisoners is the right thing to do.

When I published my Bill 11 months ago, some people probably thought I was a little crazy. I do not believe I will win much support among the electorate for publishing such a Bill. I certainly do not believe the prison population will queue up to vote for Fine Gael for publishing such a Bill. Members of this House must not always publish legislation or give the impression that we only take action if there is something in it for us. That is why I welcome this section of the Bill. I would have welcomed acceptance of my Private Members' Bill but, nonetheless, I welcome this in principle.

We are not just in the business of doing what is cute or smart. Our job is to do what is right. Sometimes we need to cut through the politically correct and the anticipated smart move and simply do what is right. There is a tendency for people in Irish society to say "Sure doesn't everybody know that will not work". This House should be about debating and critically examining ideas and about leadership. We should not be fearful of putting forward ideas because somebody in the media is stuck for a story on a slow day and will lash us for it. So what if he or she does so? The idea of doing what is right should be to the forefront of our minds.

As a former councillor and former Lord Mayor of Dublin for a protracted period, I find it extraordinary that the register of electors, primary responsibility for which rested with local authorities, is constantly an issue among public representatives, in particular. We have all had the experience in the past of standing outside a polling station — although we cannot do that anymore — when somebody came up to one and said he or she had voted for the past 20 years but was not on the register of electors. That has happened left, right and centre. The improvements made in recent years are welcome in that people can go on the register much later.

When canvassing in my constituency I came across a house in Walkinstown which had a "For Sale" sign outside it. I knocked on the door and the couple inside were from New Zealand and had lived here for a number of years. Their contracts had expired and they were returning to New Zealand. They had just voted in a New Zealand general election. A country on the other side of the world with roughly the same population as ours is able to operate a register of electors to include its own diaspora yet we cannot even properly operate a register of electors which includes people living here. That is not a criticism directed at the Minister or at anybody in particular. It is an issue we have raised for years yet we cannot seem to get it right. This is such an important issue that we should make special efforts to get it right. It is important that we are as inclusive as possible while ensuring that the tradition of voting early and often is not accommodated by any of the provisions in place.

I broadly welcome the contents of the Bill. The provisions for people to vote in prisons should be followed up with a study of what we can do to start a process of prison reform so that we can begin to try to reintegrate prisoners into society. Even if we do not get it right, the fact that we are trying to get it right will speak volumes for us as a decent society. So what if the begrudgers do not like it?

The system we have at present of recycling prisoners does nothing for victims, it only creates more victims. If we want to reduce the number of victims then we must try to reduce the number of people going into prison and coming out to re-offend. That is one contribution we could make to reducing the number of victims. I accept that victims do not want to hear that. There are times when we are all victims and we all know what we would like to do when we come out in the morning and the mirror has been broken off the car yet again.

In all of our policies the quality of mercy should inform us. It is time we returned to some of this thinking because the middle ground is becoming very crowded with everyone trying to compete for very small margins. Some of us are telling a good number of people what they want to hear instead of coming up with new ideas and showing leadership. That is something about which we should be more concerned as we address these issues.

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