Martin Ferris (Kerry North, Sinn Fein)
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Question 61: To ask the Minister for Justice and Law Reform if he will provide an update on the pilot scheme to electronically tag a number of offenders; the cost of the pilot scheme so far and when the pilot scheme will be completed. [42871/10]

Dermot Ahern (Louth, Fianna Fail)
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Part 10 of the Criminal Justice Act, 2006 provides for the introduction of electronic monitoring in this jurisdiction and I have made the relevant order commencing the provisions in the context of a restriction of movement condition applying to the granting of temporary release.

The Irish Prison Service is currently testing the use of Global Positioning System (GPS) Electronic Monitoring on a small number of prisoners who have been carefully selected having regard to a range of criteria including the nature of the offence, public safety and overall conduct in prison and who have been given temporary release. The test phase began in August 2010 and is due to run until Christmas at which time it will be evaluated to assess its viability on cost and other considerations as a tool in the management of offenders.