I move:
That leave be granted to introduce a Bill entitled an Act to amend section 35 of the Prisons Act 2007 to provide for specific provisions in regard to the use of solitary confinement in Irish prisons.
In moving the Bill, I direct the Tánaiste to figures released on the website of the Belfast Newsletter from details secured under freedom of information. The figures show that prisoners in Ireland are held in solitary confinement for 22 to 23 hours a day for months on end and in some cases for more than a year. On 1 January, a total of 51 inmates across various Irish prisons were being held in cells for at least 22 hours a day and half of them were there for over 100 days. At least nine of those prisoners had spent over a year in such conditions. The UN and scientific evidence are unequivocal in regard to these matters. More than 15 days in solitary confinement means serious and sometimes permanent psychological damage. The UN special rapporteur on torture was even more unequivocal about Ireland's practice of locking up people in solitary confinement when he said recently "There is no question to me that those people are suffering what constitutes cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment and perhaps even torture".
The Bill creates a definition of "solitary confinement" for the first time in Irish law. This is critical because in the absence of a definition, those in authority can hide behind words. In fairness, when I asked the Tánaiste about this situation recently, she used many different terms including "23-hour lock up", "punishment" and "restricted regimes". All of this language means it is difficult to access data and keep tabs on people's circumstance and it has potentially serious consequences for prisoners' human rights. We need to call it what it is, which is solitary confinement, and to accept just how serious it is and how damaging the consequences of its use and abuse can be.
In accordance with the position of the United Nations, the Bill seeks to provide that no prisoner shall spend more than 15 consecutive days in solitary confinement and that this should be an exceptional measure of last resort. It seeks to ban the use of solitary confinement as a punishment and prohibit the practice for those diagnosed with mental illness. Sadly, it too often happens that prisoners who are deemed to be unmanageable are placed in solitary confinement when what they need in reality is a serious psychological intervention. Putting them in solitary confinement actually makes their condition worse, which is terrible for the prisoners themselves, appalling for prison staff who are on the frontline and have to deal with difficult people who need specialised intervention, and damaging for society when these people are ultimately released, as they are in all instances because their problems will not only be unaddressed but in fact accentuated. In moving the Bill, I am conscious that the Government will be before the UN committee next July. It would be good if we had passed the Bill in advance as it will be one of the issues on which the Government will be questioned.
