‘Significant’ fall in the numbers being jailed

The number of people sent to prison will be “significantly” down this year, marking a reversal of years of record levels of committals.

Official figures show there were nearly 15,000 committals to the end of November, about 1,000 fewer than in the same period last year.

Based on Dec 2012 figures, the final number of committals is expected to be under 16,000 for the whole of 2013, compared to more than 17,000 for each of the last three years.

“We will not be absolutely sure of the exact figure until we have the December numbers but this year we are going to have a significant reduction on last year, when the numbers levelled off,” said a senior source in the Irish Prison Service.

The prison system has been buckling under the strain of a massive increase in prison numbers since the mid-2000s, jumping from 10,658 in 2005 to 17,179 in 2010, a rise of 61%.

Numbers reached a peak in 2011, hitting 17,318, before levelling off and dropping to 17,026 in 2012.

Prison insiders believe committals from courts will fall significantly this year, and predict the final number may be around 15,800.

This would be about 1,200 fewer cases than in 2012, a fall of roughly 7%.

The drop in committal rates is thought to be linked with a general drop in recorded crime, down in 11 of the 14 crime categories in the year up to the end of September, compared to the same period in 2012.

It may also be linked with greater use of community-based sanctions by judges.

This might be partly the result of legislation, enacted in Oct 2011, requiring the courts to first look at the option of community alternatives when considering imposing a jail sentence of 12 months or less.

Committal numbers — which reflect cases and can involve the same person committed twice — represented 12,301 people up to the end of November, compared to 13,190 in the same period last year.

At the other end of the prison system, the prison service is releasing around 1,200 inmates over the space of three years in a bid to ease overcrowding with a structured release initiative, called the community return programme.