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Tánaiste and Minister
for Justice, Equality and Law Reform (Mr. McDowell):
The Irish Prison Service
has responsibility for 16 and 17 year old children who have been ordered
to be detained by the Courts, the majority of these are male and
detained in St. Patrick’s Institution which accommodates 16 to 21 year
olds. In addition, each of the prisons in the State can accommodate
persons aged 17 years and over and the Courts have discretion to commit
17 year olds directly to prison. This can often happen at the request of
the person’s legal team in order for them to be located nearer to their
family home.
I am advised by the Director General of the Irish Prison Service that
their records indicate that there was a total of 276 persons aged under
the age of 18 years committed to their custody during 2005, of which
214, or 78%, were committed to St Patrick’s Institution. I understand
that on average last year there were, at any one time, approximately 60
male children and 1 female child detained in facilities under the remit
of the Irish Prison Service and that on 22 September 2006 there were 50
male children being detained in St. Patrick’s Institution and 10 male
and 2 female children being detained in adult prisons.
Following a review of the youth justice system the Government agreed, in
December 2005, a number of reforms including amendments to the Children
Act 2001 and the establishment of the Irish Youth Justice Service. The
Irish Youth Justice Service has been established as an executive office
of my Department and is to, inter alia, manage detention services for
young people under the age of 18 years. The legislative, operational and
administrative changes will see the transfer of responsibility for the
detention of young offenders under 18 years of age, ordered to be
detained by the Courts, from the Department of Education and Science and
the Irish Prison Service to the Irish Youth Justice Service in my
Department. The net effect of these reforms to the detention services
will be to end the practice of using adult prison places for the
detention of children and to extend the children detention school model
to all offenders under the age of 18 years.
The development and construction of children detention school places
which can accommodate 16 and 17 year old children with the requisite
facilities to provide care and education will take some time to
complete. In the interim, work is well underway in St. Patrick’s
Institution for the separation of the majority of children under the age
of 18 years from the older age groups. Planning for commencement of the
Children Act 2001, as amended, is being carried out through the close
co-operation of the Irish Youth Justice Service in my Department and
officials in the Departments of Education and Science, and Health and
Children. In addition the Government has agreed to the recruitment of a
National Manager for Detention School Services for the Irish Youth
Justice Service and I understand that this appointment will be made
shortly. A cross- departmental group has been formed to plan for the
development of detention places needed to implement the changes under
the Children Act, as amended. The transfer of the schools which are
currently within the remit of the Department of Education and Science to
the remit of the Irish Youth Justice Service will take place in 2007.
I am not aware of any mistreatment of 16 and 17 year old children in
custody in the prison system or of any reports of such mistreatment. I
can say that any such reports would be treated with the utmost
seriousness. If the Deputy has details of any alleged mistreatment, he
should pass them to my Office and I will undertake to have them
investigated. Prisoners may make a complaint about treatment in custody
through a number of channels, including local prison management, the
Prison Visiting Committee, the Inspector of Prisons, the Minister, and
he or she also has access to the Courts. They may also complain to the
European Court of Human Rights and to the European Committee for the
Prevention of Torture. In the cases where allegations of assault are
made, the Garda Síochána are called to investigate.
At a recent examination by the United Nations on the Convention on the
Rights of the Child, my colleague, Mr. Brian Lenihan T.D., Minister for
Children, made clear the results to date of our joint initiative to
reform the youth justice sector, including measures to deal with the
detention of young people in prisons. Minister Lenihan also underlined
this Government’s determination to implement the changes I have
described here.
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