Prisoner watchdog to tackle officers’ ‘impunity’

Prisoners will get a new system to make complaints about denial of family visits, bullying, assaults, and other issues, it was announced yesterday.

The development comes six years after a previous government said it was considering the idea after a European inspection body made the called.

Justice officials said there was no timeframe for the new complaints mechanism.

Last year, the Inspector of Prisons, Judge Michael Reilly, referred to the “beginning of a culture of impunity” among some prison officers in Mountjoy Prison after identifying complaints of assaults that seemed to go nowhere.

“We accept the existing complaint system is not effective,” said Jimmy Martin, assistant secretary at the Department of Justice.

He said the 2006 report, which identified comp-laints of serious abuse, was of “particularly concern”.

Speaking at an event organised by the Irish Penal Reform Trust, he said the department would be setting up a new complaints system — most likely using an existing mechanism, such as the prison visiting committees.

In response to calls at the event for an independent prison ombudsman, he said it was “highly unlikely” the Government would sanction a new office.

He said any new system would have an “element of independence”.