Expensive move

IN August 2004, the Irish Penal Reform Trust characterised Justice Minister Michael McDowell’s plans to build new super-prisons in Dublin and Cork as the minister’s own personal Bertie Bowl.

With the news that the Department of Justice paid more than ten times the market value for the site for the new Mountjoy complex in north Co Dublin, I wonder if these comments weren’t a bit unfair.

In comparison to Mr McDowell’s prison-building escapade, maybe the Bertie Bowl wasn’t such bad value for money after all.