Independent inspection of prisons lies at the heart of the current mandate of the Inspectorate and this annual report outlines some of our main findings during full general inspections of six of the thirteen prisons in Ireland. These included a prison for women, the State’s second largest prison, main remand prison and an open prison. Taken together, these prisons house around 40% of the people living in prisons in Ireland. Each of the prisons inspected has its own unique features, but some systemic issues have clearly emerged. Chief amongst these is the scourge of overcrowding, which is affecting almost every prison in Ireland. This report also identifies a lack of access to purposeful activity and limited out-of-cell time for people on restricted regimes as systemic issues in several of the prisons inspected. 

During inspections, our team pays close attention to the quality of relations between people living in prisons and prison staff. In 2023, we observed very many examples of prison staff engaging with people in their custody in a highly professional and often compassionate way. Regrettable exceptions were noted during the September 2023 inspection of the Dóchas Centre in Dublin, where the cumulative effect of poor staff-prisoner dynamics and overly punitive sanctions was having a substantial adverse effect on the day-to-day lives of the women living there. These latest findings echo the concerns raised about this establishment from 2020 onwards by my predecessor, Chief Inspector Patricia Gilheaney.

Another cross-cutting theme is the quality of psychiatric care available to people living in prisons. In February and March 2023, the Inspectorate carried out a thematic inspection to evaluate this issue in seven prisons. The report was published, together with an Action Plan by the Irish Prison Service, in early 2024. We found that people with serious mental health disorders being held in prisons were not receiving the right care, in the right environment, at the right time. The IPS has committed to implement those of the Inspectorate’s recommendations that lie within its powers, and I was heartened that, at the public launch of the report, similar undertakings were given by representatives of the National Forensic Mental Health Service and the Health Service Executive. Resolving these longstanding issues will require far closer operational cooperation between the Department of Justice and the Department of Health.