Parliamentary Question: Mental Health Services

15th October 2003

101. Mr. Gormley asked the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform the agreement which has been reached between the Department of Health and Children and his Department regarding who is responsible for the provision of mental health services for prisoners and the way in which they should be provided since the 2001 report of the group to review the structure and organisation of prison health care services was published. [23437/03]

Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform (Mr. McDowell): Arising from long-standing difficulties with the recruitment and retention of health care staff to work with prisoners, a group to review the structure and organisation of prison health care services was established in 1999. The group's report, published in 2001, makes a total of 43 recommendations covering various aspects of prison health care including GP, nursing, pharmacy, dental, and psychiatry services.

Arising from the publication of this report, a prison health working group comprising representatives from both the health care directorate of the Irish Prison Service and the health boards, together with representatives from both the Department of Health and Children and the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform, was established. This group, under the chair of Mr. Pat McLoughlin, CEO of the South Eastern Health Board, has met on a number of occasions with a view to seeking to implement the agreed recommendations of the report.

This working group is currently exploring means of implementing the core recommendations of this report, including those referring to treatment structures relating to offenders with mental health problems. In particular, it is my intention that health care facilities for prisoners should broadly mirror public health facilities provided in the general community. The implementation of appropriate structures will require the active co-operation of a range of agencies, in particular the Department of Health and Children and local health boards.

The working group is currently examining the feasibility of developing partnership arrangements with regard to the provision of various aspects of health care, including mental health provision, to prisoners. To date, there has not been any definitive outcome or agreement reached regarding how overall responsibility in this matter is to be allocated.

In the context of concern expressed at the detention of mentally ill prisoners awaiting transfer to the Central Mental Hospital, the Government ordered that the relevant agencies, the Irish Prison Service and the East Coast Area Health Board, should draw up a service level agreement with a view to eliminating delays in the provision of in-patient psychiatric care to mentally ill prisoners. This agreement has now been drafted and is under consideration by the relevant Government Departments.