"Sometimes I'm missing the words": The rights, needs and experiences of foreign national and minority ethnic groups in the Irish penal system

27th April 2022

The Irish Penal Reform Trust launched an independently commissioned exploratory research study on the rights and experiences of foreign national and minority ethnic groups in the Irish penal system on Thursday 27 April 2022. "Sometimes I'm missing the words": The rights, needs and experiences of foreign national and minority ethnic groups in the Irish penal system was supported by the Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission (IHREC) under the Human Rights and Equality Grant Scheme 2020-2021.

Very little information exists on the needs and lived experiences of minority ethnic and foreign national people in prisons and on probation in Ireland. This report aimed to bridge that gap and consider these needs and experiences within the context of relevant policy and law. The report was commissioned by IPRT from the Maynooth University School of Law and Criminology.

The need for reform is outlined in 18 recommendations made in the report.

Findings from the research include:

Based on an analysis of the quantitative data provided by the Irish Prison Service (IPS), it was found that foreign nationals may receive longer sentences than Irish nationals for controlled drug offences and sexual offences.
Further analysis, along with interviews from professional stakeholders, established that the IPS data – while including statistics on prisoners’ nationality – was deficient in the areas of ethnicity and religion of the prison population.
Interview data revealed that there were significant challenges faced by foreign nationals and minority ethnic people in prison concerning access to services, respect for different religious backgrounds, as well as language and communication barriers.
Experiences of racism at different stages of the criminal justice process had the effect of limiting trust with any part of the penal system.

Read the report in full here, or download it below.

This project is supported by the Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission, under the Human Rights and Equality Grants Scheme 2020.