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

The proposal being worked on at the moment is to expand the number of spaces we have within the existing prison capacity. The proposal is for between 620 and 650 new spaces to be delivered over the next five to six years. Some projects are shovel-ready and have plans already developed that can be moved on quickly to cater for the fact that we have a growing population. At the same time we need to make sure we have a very clear plan to look at penal policy reform and ways we can prevent reoffending. We need to make sure that while we have additional capacity we also look at how we can keep people out of prison in order to reduce that cycle. One of the previous questions that the Minister of State, Deputy James Browne, addressed was to do with the significant work of the mental health task force. This will play its part in making sure that people who should not be in prison and should be in other services are looked after. That will be considered as part of the overall capacity.

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