Charles Flanagan (Laois-Offaly, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I would be happy to keep a close eye on matters and to continue to engage with the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland on the issue. I assure the Deputy that my officials at the British-Irish Intergovernmental Secretariat engage very carefully in ongoing monitoring of prison issues, including prisoner conditions, and discuss them regularly with their counterparts. We all have a duty to use language responsibly in regard to these sensitive matters and to avoid giving any succour to dissident groups by our public statements in regard to them. I again deplore the continuing threats made against prison officers in Maghaberry Prison by so-called dissident republicans. The prison officers have a right to live their lives free from threat from faceless criminals.

I understand what the Deputy has said and assure him of my continuing engagement and that of the Taoiseach to whom I understand he addressed some correspondence in the not too distant past.

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