Emer Higgins (Dublin Mid West, Fine Gael)
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598. To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Justice and Equality the status of future planning for the Prison Service; and the way that additional capacity is being built in to cater for the rising population. [50006/22]

Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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As the Deputy will be aware, the Prison Service must accept all prisoners committed by the Courts and the prison system is, of course, subject to peaks and troughs. Numbers are particularly high when the Courts are at their busiest and following the return to a more normal level of Court activity, committal numbers have increased across the prison system. The Deputy may wish to know that there were 5,219 committals to prison for the period January to September 2022 which is a 13% increase on the same period in 2021.

I am informed by my officials in the Prison Service that the total number of prisoners in custody on 10 October 2022 was 4,196 compared with a bed capacity of 4,471. This represents an occupancy level of 94%.

As the Deputy will be aware the Government has provided significant capital funding to the Irish Prison Service in order to enhance the existing prison infrastructure, eliminate the practice known as slopping out, and to provide additional capacity where required.

The Deputy will also be aware of the works completed in recent years to modernise the entire Mountjoy Prison complex, the construction of a new prison in Cork and the provision of additional prisoner accommodation in the Midlands Prison.

This year, the Irish Prison Service reopened the newly refurbished Training Unit Place of Detention as a centre for older prisoners in Mountjoy and this has provided an additional 96 prisoner spaces. The construction of a new male wing and a female prison is underway in Limerick Prison and will provide 90 additional male and 22 additional female cell spaces. The new accommodation is expected to become operational by the end of 2022 assuming there is no further impact on construction activity or supply chain issues due to the pandemic.

Significant growth has been experienced in the remand prison population in recent years which has resulted in pressures on remand prison facilities including Cloverhill Prison. The Irish Prison Service is currently undertaking a strategic assessment exercise on the potential for additional accommodation at Cloverhill Prison in line with the requirements of the Public Spending Code.

Separately, the Programme for Government 2020 contains a broad range of policies and proposals that represent a coherent approach to enhancing and sustaining a more just and safe society, with a specific commitment to review policy options for prison and penal reform. In respect of delivering on this commitment, I recently published the Review of Policy Options for Prison and Penal Reform 2022-2024.

The review seeks to find the balance between ensuring that people who commit serious crimes receive a punishment and a period of incarceration proportionate to that crime, while at the same time acknowledging that sometimes community based sanctions are more appropriate in diverting offenders away from future criminal activity.

Sentencing is a matter solely within the discretion of the trial judge, having regard to the circumstances of the case and of the accused and subject to any limits as may be prescribed by law for a particular offence. While these proposals do not change this, they are intended to strengthen the options available to judges when they are considering cases, to facilitate the effective and efficient use of community sanctions by the courts, and to ensure that the courts have a wide range of appropriate options for dealing with people who have committed minor offences.

In addition, as part of delivering the Penal Policy action plan, the need to ensure the continued availability of modern prison facilities with adequate capacity will continue to be central to the work of the Irish Prison Service and will be core to the development of the new Irish Prison Service Capital Strategy 2023.