IPRT Pre-Budget Submission Budget 2026
15th September 2025
Irish Penal Reform Trust (IPRT) has prepared our pre-Budget submission to legislators for consideration ahead of Budget 2026. This submission is written against the backdrop of an acute prison overcrowding crisis, the likes of which Ireland has not seen before. The overall prison population reached its peak in mid-August 2025, with 5,581 people in custody, representing 120 per cent of prison capacity. To meet this demand for prisonspace, nearly 496 prisoners had to sleep on mattresses placed on the ground. Overcrowding affects every aspect of prisons, increasing tensions, creating unsafe conditions and placing a strain on resources that limits the availability of urgent and essential services to people in prison.
The present prison overcrowding crisis is the product of policy decisions that have failed to address the root causes of offending behaviour, limited community-based alternatives to short prison sentences, and a failure to invest in a person-centred model to prevent reoffending. While capital investment in prison modernisation and improved material conditions for all people in prison is crucial to assist in upholding the rights of people in custody, IPRT maintains that prison expansion will not address the current overcrowding crisis in either the short- or long-term. If financial resources and political will are not invested in supporting and championing effective alternatives to prison, the resources needed to continually increase the prison estate will be a financial and social drain on the State for decades to come.
IPRT reiterates our view that while imprisonment is a necessary and proportionate sanction in some cases where there is a threat to public safety, in many other cases it is an ineffective, counterproductive, disproportionate and hugely expensive response to offending. This is particularly so in the context of short sentences (less than 12 months), which made up over two-thirds of all sentenced committals to prison in 2024. IPRT believes that both short- and long-term savings can be made within discrete areas of the Justice vote by shifting emphasis to more efficient and effective responses to offending, some of which lie outside of the Justice vote.
In Budget 2026, IPRT is calling on the Government to invest in:
Mental Health and Addiction
- Allocate €500K to the Irish Prison Service to develop training pathways and programmes to upskill Prison Officers in supporting themental health needs of people in custody.
- Allocate €1m to the Irish Prison Service to conduct a Mental Health Needs Assessment.
Reduce Remand
- Allocate and ring-fence €300k to the Probation Service to cover staffing and operational costs associated with establishing a supported bail service for women.
Invest in Alternatives
- Invest €540k in the expansion of the Prison In-reach and Court Liaison Service (PICLS) to at least one other prison in 2026.
Enhance Accountability
- Provide an additional €175k in funding to the Office of the Ombudsman to expand its remit to review prisoner complaints.
- Allocate €450k of ringfenced funding to the Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission, the Office of the Inspector of Prisons and other statutory bodies or agencies that will form part of the National Preventive Mechanism.
Support Social Reintegration
- Invest €1m in supports for people leaving prison, including provision of accommodation and support into employment.
