Eoghan Murphy (Dublin South East, Fine Gael)
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Question 160: To ask the Minister for Justice and Equality his plans to implement or assist in after care programmes for those who have just been released from prison. [36756/11]

Alan Shatter (Dublin South, Fine Gael)
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The Irish Prison Service provides a range of rehabilitative programmes which have the dual purpose of providing prisoners with purposeful activity while serving their sentences and encouraging and equipping them to lead productive lives on release. Several programmes and services have a specific post-release focus.

The Prison Service funds the Gate Service operated by Business in the Community Ireland (BITC) which provides a training, education, and employment placement programme for prisoners and ex-prisoners. The GATE Service operates in seven of the country's fourteen institutions. The BITC Linkage Programme provides a similar service in the remaining institutions and operates in partnership with the Probation Service. The BITC Mentoring Service which is jointly funded by the Prison Service and Dormant Accounts Funding is in place in Castlerea, Cork and the Training Unit. Mentoring has been shown internationally to have a positive impact on the resettlement and desistance of ex-prisoners.

Focus Ireland operates a pilot homeless service in Cloverhill Prison which supports remand prisoners in accessing appropriate services and accommodation on the pathway to independent living. The project is supported by the Irish Prison Service, the Probation Service and the Health Service Executive (HSE). Homelessness support services are also provided in Cork and Limerick prisons. A weekly clinic service is provided in ten prisons by the Health Service Executive Community Welfare Service through the Homeless Persons Unit (HPU). Referrals generally are at the pre-release stage and Community Welfare Officers provide information and clinic services, and arrange emergency and other accommodation options, supplementary benefits and fast-tracked medical cards.

The Prison Education Centres, staffed by Vocational Education Committee teachers, provide pre-release and post-release programmes aimed at assisting prisoner resettlement. These are currently being reviewed as part of an ongoing comprehensive independent audit of prison education. Prisoner resettlement is also an objective of the Prison Service's integrated sentence management system. It is in operation in all prisons and seeks to provide integrated cross-disciplinary sentence management focused on the prisoner's resettlement from the moment of committal to release.