FAMILIES of prisoners will suffer as a result of the transfer of inmates from the Mountjoy complex to a new super prison in rural north Dublin, teachers and probation officers said yesterday.

CHILDREN are carrying out more crimes involving extreme violence and the system for dealing with them is a “farce”, probation officers warned yesterday.

IRELAND is facing a "cocaine epidemic" and the Government urgently needs to fund prevention and treatment, probation officers said yesterday.

PROBATION Service management has written to the Department of Justice telling it that only 17 of the 100 posts earmarked for decentralisation can feasibly be transferred.