Results 9,161-9,180 of 16,849 for speaker:Dermot Ahern

Prison Building Programme. (27 May 2009)

Dermot Ahern: It is not for me to speculate about the current value. The cost of the site at the time of purchase was €29.9 million, which was largely offset by the sale of prison lands at Shanganagh Castle, County Dublin. Thus, it was legitimate use of the existing prison stock in order to buy new stock. Further sums totalling approximately €11.7 million were expended on the project, including...

Prison Building Programme. (27 May 2009)

Dermot Ahern: The 150-acre site cost approximately €199,000 per acre. It was more for agricultural land, but if it had been zoned as residential land it would have been valued at much more, perhaps €1 million per acre at that time. There was no other suitable site as close to Dublin city centre. The project team considered 30 different sites and this was regarded as the best value given its...

Prison Building Programme. (27 May 2009)

Dermot Ahern: -----in view of the fact that the Government is adamant that it is proceeding with this project.

Prison Building Programme. (27 May 2009)

Dermot Ahern: I do not accept that for one minute. As I said, this was the best site available with reasonable proximity to Dublin city. People such as the Deputies would complain if this prison were in the middle of nowhere, but it is not. It is contiguous with the confluence of a number of motorways, two miles from the M50 and ten miles from the city centre. It is an extremely good site. I explained...

Prison Building Programme. (27 May 2009)

Dermot Ahern: Yes, but he suggested, as I remember, that it would have been purchased far more cheaply if it had contacted an auctioneer and allowed him or her to find a site.

Prison Building Programme. (27 May 2009)

Dermot Ahern: However, that would not have been transparent and it would have been unfair to the local people-----

Prison Building Programme. (27 May 2009)

Dermot Ahern: -----who would have woken up one morning to find that the State had purchased, out of the blue, a property on which it proposed to build a prison. No matter where the prison is put there will be people who will object.

Prison Building Programme. (27 May 2009)

Dermot Ahern: However, the Prison Service did it in an open and transparent way.

Prison Building Programme. (27 May 2009)

Dermot Ahern: Clearly, the type of information the Deputies have to hand is coming from some location. They seem prone to criticising people outside this House who are involved in consortiums and tender for projects.

Prison Building Programme. (27 May 2009)

Dermot Ahern: I do not know the type of figures the Deputies are referring to or the discussions involved. All I know, as I said on the private notice question, is that when we made a decision based on the final offer made by the consortium for the whole project, it would have cost the taxpayer hundreds of millions over the 25 years of repayments, and that the figure was 30% more than when the preferred...

Prison Building Programme. (27 May 2009)

Dermot Ahern: I am not saying that.

Prison Building Programme. (27 May 2009)

Dermot Ahern: The Prison Service was using the estate properly. Shanganagh was an outdated prison and did not have the type of prisoner capable of going into it. The sale was good value. More times than not agencies of the State come to the Department of Finance looking for resources but the Department was able to purchase this, not just because it got money from Shanganagh.

Prison Building Programme. (27 May 2009)

Dermot Ahern: They were able to roll over that money and purchase another site. Obviously, it had to negotiate the best price in the interests of the taxpayer.

Prison Building Programme. (27 May 2009)

Dermot Ahern: That is what the Department did given the constraints it had, rather than going surreptitiously to buy a site, getting it perhaps for less, and then announcing to the public that it was going to be the site of a prison. It was open and upfront and, because of that, the people who owned the site knew exactly who was buying it. The Deputy is right that I was not involved but the project team...

Prison Building Programme. (27 May 2009)

Dermot Ahern: The recommendation was this was the best value, given the proximity to Dublin.

Prison Building Programme. (27 May 2009)

Dermot Ahern: Deputy Rabbitte has a thing about Deputy Woods; he even referred to him at his 60th birthday party.

Prison Building Programme. (27 May 2009)

Dermot Ahern: I thought he had a thing about me.

Prison Accommodation. (27 May 2009)

Dermot Ahern: I propose to take Questions Nos. 53, 62 and 108 together. The reports referred to are greatly exaggerated. The correct situation is that paramilitary prisoners are located in the maximum security Portlaoise Prison which, in addition to the usual perimeter security, has armed military presence. Subversive prisoners in Portlaoise Prison have a somewhat different regime from other prisoners...

Prison Accommodation. (27 May 2009)

Dermot Ahern: Visitors to republican prisoners are subject to searches similar to other visitors.

Prison Accommodation. (27 May 2009)

Dermot Ahern: I am informed by the Prison Service that the same search regimes will be introduced to all prisons in the near future. The newspaper reports that a particular prisoner in Portlaoise Prison has the use of four cells are a distortion of the facts. He has the same cell as all other prisoners. There are two unoccupied cells on the same landing that are used for craft and education. The reports...