€50m super-prison land grows veg

Department of Justice officials are set to be hauled before the Dáil’s spending watchdog after it emerged there was never any reason to spend €50m on the “white elephant” Thornton Hall super-prison project.

The cross-party public accounts committee confirmed it is writing to the Government department after the fresh concerns over the Celtic Tiger-era purchase, and whether there was any political motivation for the deal.

Since it was bought a decade ago for €50m — a figure far above the cost of other land in the area, leading to significant criticism of then justice minister Michael McDowell — the 150-acre site on the Dublin-Meath border has been a continued bone of contention.

The location was purchased to build a 1,400-cell “super prison” in 2005.

However, despite repeated comments from those in power at the time — including then taoiseach Brian Cowen as late as 2009 — that the project would be built, it remains a large empty stretch of land which prison authorities now use to grow vegetables.

It had been claimed at the time of the deal that Thornton Hall was needed as Mountjoy prison could not find any in-cell accommodation.

However, producing correspondence from the Department of Justice’s acting secretary general Noel Watters at the Public Accounts Committee yesterday, Labour TD Joe Costello said the senior official now accepts the money was spent for no reason.

Mr Costello said despite the initial reason for the purchase, when the super-prison did not go ahead the authorities “managed to find in-cell accommodation” at Mountjoy anyway.

An outraged Mr Costello said the revelation is “incredible” and demands answers from those involved in the deal.

PAC chair and Fianna Fáil TD John McGuinness said he will ask senior Department of Justice officials to attend an upcoming PAC meeting to explain the scandal — adding pointedly there is a need to clarify if the deal was politically driven.