Every complaint made by inmates against prison officers under a new independent investigation system have so far turned out to be baseless.

Seventeen-year-old inmates at St Patrick’s Institute for Young Offenders could be moved out of the facility in the near future, Children’s Minister Frances Fitzgerald said yesterday.

There are calls for prison officers who abused young offenders in St Patricks Institution to be identified and removed from their positions.

For the first time in 160 years, an imposing building which dominates Killarney, Co Kerry, and which once had more than 1,000 residents, was unoccupied last night.

The number of inmates in Irish prisons increased by 11% last year, according to the latest annual report from the Inspector of Prisons.

What an extraordinary attack Justice Minister Michael McDowell launched at the Inspector of Prisons, retired High Court judge Dermot Kinlen, in a radio interview at the weekend.

PEELING paint on dilapidated buildings, children stuck in adult wards, nurses running fundraisers to try to improve their patients’ comfort.

THE Government should stop dithering about Ireland’s suicide epidemic and urgently implement a €60 million package of reforms to cut death rates, an influential group of TDs said yesterday.

The Inspector of Prisons has recommended that Irish jails be privatised in an effort to make them more efficient and cost-effective.

The failure to deliver on an agreement between the Departments of Justice and Health, to facilitate a faster transfer of mentally ill prisoners to hospital, is resulting in them being denied crucial treatment.

GOVERNMENT plans to sell lands belonging to the State’s psychiatric institutions to fund mental health care were met with scepticism yesterday.

The Government is reportedly planning to sell off hundreds of acres of land at psychiatric hospitals throughout the country to raise funds for the mental health sector.

JUSTICE MINISTER Michael McDowell is to review the controversial prison visiting committee system.

THE Government’s record on prisons was condemned last night, following the publication of a report on the State’s penal system.