Prison Service fighting 'losing battle' against overcrowding (Irish Examiner)
2nd December 2025
The article outlines the severe and escalating overcrowding across Ireland’s prisons, echoing the findings of IPRT’s Progress in the Penal System (PIPS) 2024 report. Executive Director Saoirse Brady stresses that expanding prison spaces will not resolve the crisis, as new beds are quickly filled while conditions and rights deteriorate.
IPRT highlights that the prison system is now operating at breaking point, with record levels of overcrowding, rising violence, hundreds sleeping on mattresses beside toilets, and a growing population with unmet mental health and addiction needs. The organisation warns that the State is failing to uphold basic dignity and that prisons are increasingly absorbing the failures of wider social and health services.
With 77% of sentences lasting 12 months or less and the use of community sanctions continuing to decline, IPRT calls for urgent implementation and funding of non-custodial alternatives and community-based supports.
Related items:
- Prisoner numbers on course to reach 'unimaginable' level - The Irish Examiner
- Electronic tags for released prisoners to be trialled - Live 95 (Limerick)
- Number of non-nationals in Irish jails has more than doubled in past five years - Irish Mail on Sunday
- No electronic tagging of prisoners yet despite 2007 law paving the way - Irish Independent
- Urgent calls to address major overcrowding in Limerick Prison - Limerick Post
