Deputy Dan Neville: 
It is the Government’s decision.
Deputy Dermot Ahern: It was agreed in principle. The decision was for the HSE and the Department of Health and Children. While it may need to revert to the Government, the position remains as it was yesterday in that respect.
Deputy Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin: I note with some relief the Minister’s acknowledgement that there is an alternative to PPPs. On the indication of the possible use of the NPRF for major public capital works, my colleagues and I would have argued for this time after time.
Yesterday’s announcement regarding Thornton Hall comes hot on the heels of the collapse of regeneration plans for some of Dublin’s most marginalised communities. The common denominator between the PPP arrangements for the regeneration of St. Michael’s Estate, O’Devaney Gardens, Sean McDermott Street, Dominick Street and Thornton Hall is Mr. Bernard McNamara. Irrespective of the fact that the Minister rejects the charge and despite the proven unreliability of PPPs with this particular developer, which is knowledge that the Government has had for 12 months, it is arguable that the Government has wasted approximately €11 million on site security and preparatory works on top of the original expenditure of some €30 million for a site that, as other Deputies have indicated, was only worth in the order of €6 million at the time.
I am concerned about whether Thornton Hall will ever be used for a prison and I strongly oppose any idea of co-location with a relocated Central Mental Hospital. The latter would be an outrageous proposition with which to proceed. I join Deputy Neville in using this opportunity to appeal for a complete reappraisal of that proposition.
An Ceann Comhairle: The Deputy’s time has expired.
Deputy Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin: Will the Government produce a plan, including a timeframe, for the required works on the existing prison stock to address the questions of upgrades and overcrowding? As the question that I read into the record indicated, what steps will the Minister take to remove more non-violent offenders from the prison system? Does the Minister not agree that doing so would be a more cost effective way of addressing overcrowding? Will he ensure that the Fines Bill 2009, which only passed Second Stage last week after a delay of some seven years, is progressed to the final Stages?
Deputy Dermot Ahern: Which Bill was that?
An Ceann Comhairle: The Fines Bill.
Deputy Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin: Will the Minister introduce additional legislation or amendments to the Bill to end the practice whereby people are imprisoned simply because they are unable to pay a debt? Recently, there was a high profile case in my constituency in that respect.
An Ceann Comhairle: The Deputy has gone well over time.
Deputy Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin: It is before the courts for consideration. Will the Minister make arrangements to remove immigrants who are routinely detained for technical or logistical reasons from the prison system, given the fact that they are not being detained in prison circumstances for any crimes and that their presence there is unacceptable? A body of people across all of the areas that I have indicated is inflating prison numbers. The Government should take the key step of ensuring that people should not be inappropriately placed in prison.
Deputy Dermot Ahern: Regarding the Fines Bill, we will change the law in every way possible to avoid imprisonment as a last resort for the non-payment of fines. No matter what legislation we pass in this respect, however imprisonment must be the ultimate solution if people ignore fines completely. From my practice as a solicitor of many years, there are many opportunities for people to pay fines. Hurdles must be crossed before anyone is sent to prison. However, I accept——
Deputy Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin: There must be an alternative.
Deputy Dermot Ahern: To the best of my recollection, approximately 4,000 people are in prison at any one time, some 0.4% of whom are there for the non-payment of fines. They have refused every exhortation and have probably been obstinate in paying the fines. They are not there because of an inability to pay. Rather, they have adopted a principled position to go to prison instead of paying the fines. We cannot get away from that situation no matter what legislation we pass.
I have outlined the case as regards the purchase. The €10 million over and above the land’s purchase would have been spent regardless of which consortium or option we chose. It was necessary to expend that money. It is not dead money. What was done will obviously fit into any subsequent options that are looked at by me. Regarding time scales, I will come back to the Government in a number of weeks and hopefully we will make an announcement.
Our intention would be to have this out for tender sooner rather than later, so that interested parties would have a good period of time over the summer months, when perhaps the building industry is somewhat more dormant than normal, and such parties would have an opportunity to tender. We may then be able to come back to it towards the end of the year.
I do not want to be prescriptive regarding time-scales because this is a major project. There is a difference of hundreds of millions of euro between the original price and that which was finally suggested and we did not accept. We must be given some credit, in that if we had responded and agreed to the type of costs, namely, a 30% increase, people in this House and outside would, rightly, query, particularly in the context of the economic situation generally in this country, why we would go ahead with such a project. We will be looking at all the options in the coming weeks.
Deputy Charles Flanagan: Regarding where we go from here, the Minister, Deputy Ahern, speaks of other options. Will he confirm to the House that this massive project is, in effect, dead in the water and the option to be explored now is in line with best international practice? He should go back to the drawing board and bring forward realistic plans for a smaller, scaled-down version of Thornton Hall, to deal with the replacement of Mountjoy. He should forget about the Central Mental Hospital and a super prison that would incorporate up to 4,400 prison spaces, but deal with the replacement of Mountjoy——
Deputy Dermot Ahern: How many spaces did the Deputy mention?
Deputy Charles Flanagan: The Minister said there would be 2,200 and there would be provision to double those, in the event one needs to, as in Mountjoy——
Deputy Dermot Ahern: No.
Deputy Charles Flanagan: ——where people are put on the floor.
Deputy Dermot Ahern: No, the ultimate figure would be 2,200, doubled up.
Deputy Charles Flanagan: I ask the Minister to come back to the House with a scaled-down version that will deal with the replacement of Mountjoy and accept his massive project is dead in the water.
Deputy Dermot Ahern: I want to clarify the position. Thornton Hall comprised 1,200 rooms to facilitate 1,200 prisoners, but there was a facility, because of the size of the rooms, to, in effect, double up to 2,200, not 4,400. The ultimate capacity of the prison would be 2,200, in the way in which it was designed.
Deputy Charles Flanagan: That is too big, in any event.
Deputy Dermot Ahern: As this is a long-term project, we have time to consider how we proceed. That would be to look again at the overall project, which was a super or large prison comprising 1,200 rooms. It may very well be that we will look, as the Taoiseach indicated this morning on Leaders’ Questions, at perhaps phasing it in over time. Ultimately, we will build and finish a prison in the type of large scale envisaged in the original proposal. I do not know who mentioned a cost of €6 million, it was not Deputy Flanagan. I have not heard that before. Even if one got 150 acres of very good agricultural land in the west, I do not think one would buy it for €6 million.
Deputy Dan Neville: One could buy it for €3 million.
Deputy Dermot Ahern: In 2007?
Deputy Dan Neville: It was only €10,000 an acre.
Deputy Pat Rabbitte: The Minister invites me to agree with him that whatever about the preferred bidder, he had other options. He never said anything of the kind. He never communicated to this House that there was any doubt about the preferred bidder. When the same preferred bidder pulled out from housing projects, I asked the Minister repeatedly if he had satisfied himself about its capacity to deliver. All the Minister did was give me lectures about how he would not be seen on the same side of the street as a developer. I do not know what the Minister has against developers, but it was a very odd thing to say.
I want to ask the Minister a question and would be greatly pleased if he would do me the courtesy of listening to it. He has told the House most of the 30% increase in cost is due to the cost of finance. If this bidder had a difficulty with the cost of finance, how does the Minister propose to tell the House that another preferred bidder would not have exactly the same difficulty with the cost of sourcing money?
Did I hear the Minister say that the difference between the original price and the price the preferred bidder was now trying to extract was hundreds of millions of euro? That is what I wrote down, namely, that the difference is hundreds of millions of euro. How much will this project cost us? I would like the Minister to clarify that.
I again put the question to the Minister that has been put by my colleagues. Is it not time to re-think whether the notion of the American-style super prison is what we require? It is especially the case that we need to re-think it if one is talking about the difference between the price in 2007 and now being hundred of millions of euro.
How can the Minister ask this House, having regard to electronic voting, PPARS and the collapse of Thornton Hall, to have confidence in the Government? If this Government was tasked with building a duck pond, the ducks would drown.
Deputy Dermot Ahern: Regarding the Deputy’s assertion that I did not indicate at any stage there were any difficulties with this, as I said many times, I was not privy to, nor did I take part in, any of the negotiations. I was informed by my officials as to how the discussions were going. No more than anyone in this House, I was agitating to ensure this would be built as soon as possible so we could have the available prison spaces.
On 9 October 2008 I said, in response to parliamentary questions asked by Deputies James Reilly and Leo Varadkar, that in the current fiscal situation facing the country it is important that we all strive to reduce costs, live within our budgets and avoid any cost increases, that the bidder must meet all the criteria, including the financial criteria, in the tender and although a preferred tenderer was selected, there were other tenderers and other viable options which could still be considered if for any reason the negotiations referred to were not successfully concluded.
On 29 October, in response to a question asked by Deputy Charles Flanagan, I said there were other tenderers and options which could still be considered. In November, I said the same to Deputy Aengus Ó Snodaigh. I said on numerous occasions that it had to reach certain affordability criteria. There is a long list and I can give it to the Deputy if required.
Regarding the issue of hundreds of millions of euro, this is a major project. We would have been guilty of a dereliction of duty if we were to agree to a proposal where the cost of finance, which it is accepted would be an issue with other bidders, would be a substantial issue regarding the overall cost.
Where there was not a quid pro quo regarding a significant reduction in the construction costs, and when we see in other projects that the reduction in costs of tenders can be 10% or 20% across any building project in which the Government is involved, we believe we should, in effect, cut off the negotiations because this was unaffordable in its current form and we would look again at the other viable options. As I said earlier, it may be that we will consider the possibility of funding this through PPPs or the pension reserve fund.
A number of other ancillary services within the prison might not necessarily be required in the future. For instance, there was provision for a juvenile block for Oberstown House. We can reconsider a number of the details of the original proposal that would ultimately reduce the cost but still get us the net result of having a substantial prison facility on the Thornton Hall site that would deal with the prison population for approximately 15 to 20 years hence.
Deputy Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin: The Minister claimed in his response to me that the sum of approximately €11 million that had been expended in the period since the purchase of Thornton Hall was all moneys employed as part of future investment for the project, and that it was not wasted money. Whatever has been expended, if the footprint of what was proposed is not to proceed, surely in terms of site security and whatever other development works, a significant element of it will not have any forward application. It is a sustainable argument that moneys have been expended unnecessarily over the period, if at the end of the day the whole thing goes pear-shaped and the money is wasted. It will join the litany of many other areas of wastage by this Government in the past decade plus.
The Minister made reference to alternative funding mechanisms. I emphasise this is not to in any way commend an approach to Thornton Hall by any alternative means. I record again my opposition to the proposition in principle, both in regard to the so-called super prison and to the transfer of the Central Mental Hospital. The Minister has indicated that there are realistic alternatives to the employment of PPPs in terms of funding public capital works. That is the first time I have heard such talk for some time, if at all previously. I commend that approach for appropriate public capital works in the future. The National Pensions Reserve Fund is just such a mechanism for funding these works into the future.
Will the Minister employ that mechanism to fund the essential major refurbishment works necessary in existing prison facilities, having ensured that the current prison numbers are reduced appropriately in line with earlier arguments. I refer to the detainment of persons for the non-payment of fines, many of whom, despite what the Minister said, are in prison because they cannot afford to make repayments. People are in prison because they are unable or incapable of meeting debt repayments to various financial institutions, a number of whom are clearly from each and every one of our constituencies. I refer also to those I mentioned previously, immigrants who are unnecessarily detained in prison environments due to technical matters relevant to their presence in this jurisdiction. Surely, those are the steps and measures that must be taken? The National Pensions Reserve Fund is a means of funding the necessary works to address the already inadequate prison conditions that are in use today.
Deputy Dermot Ahern: I wish to scotch the myth of this being a super prison. It is eight separate facilities within an overall site. It was designed in such a way that all of the separate facilities could share services and provide value for money due to the economies of scale involved. That goes back to the point I made earlier, that it is better to have sizeable prisons rather than a plethora of smaller prisons around the country with separate systems and staff. It is preferable to have economies of scale and that was the principle behind the project. It is not like an American super-style prison, it was to be designed and built in the most modern way according to best international practice.
On the use of PPPs, it is still a viable option because under it the State, and therefore the taxpayer, would not have paid a penny until such time as the prison was handed over. The unitary annual costs would not begin until the prison was handed over. That would be a benefit from the point of view of the Exchequer.
Deputy Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin: That is short-termist in the long term.
Deputy Dermot Ahern: No, that was the position under which the project was going to be financed if we had gone with this tender. We will consider other options. In the meantime, thanks to the good judgment of this Government, we have a National Pensions Reserve Fund. Despite the criticism of the sale of Eircom, the first deposit into the fund was €8 billion from that sale. In addition, we passed legislation to dedicate 1% of GNP to the National Pensions Reserve Fund.
Deputy Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin: I would not be proud of that start.
Deputy Dermot Ahern: The possibility exists for the use of those funds. That is something we will consider. I have already had discussions with the Minister for Finance about the use of the National Pensions Reserve Fund for the overall building programme. This Government stands on its record, in that since 1997 we have increased the number of prison places by 1,300, in total contrast to what happened previously when no places were added for many years. We are now adding another 400 places before the end of the year.
Deputy Pat Rabbitte: I wish to get the Minister to focus once again on the figures. If the difference is hundreds of millions, and the difference is 30%, then the full cost of the project must be more than three times hundreds of millions. I do not think the public or the taxpayer has ever heard that figure before today. It seems to me to be the best argument for rethinking the entire project. I put it to the Minister again, now that the collapse has taken place, is it not an opportunity to go back to the drawing board? If the Minister has 400 places coming on-stream then there is a breathing space for us to work this out. It is unthinkable that we should have to pay the kind of money that is now being talked about to fund this project. Regardless of whatever happens to the site in the future, the Prison Service acquired it. The Minister’s Green Party colleagues in Government opposed the purchase bitterly at the time. Perhaps they would have some use for it but for us to pile hundreds of millions on top of it——
Deputy Charles Flanagan: Allotments.
Deputy Pat Rabbitte: There used to be allotments in north Dublin. It could be useful for that. The Minister should give the House some idea of the scale of millions about which we are talking. I ask him for the third and last time, why he presumes that if one developer has had this difficulty in sourcing money at an affordable cost, that changing horses to a different developer would allow for the sourcing of money at a significantly cheaper cost.
Deputy Dermot Ahern: Because we would expect that, given the prevailing economic circumstances and market conditions, that other bidders would be able to give a better reduction on the construction costs. That was not the case in respect of this particular tenderer and that is why ultimately it was not affordable.
On the hundreds of millions and the 30% increase, one cannot build a prison with eight facilities to the highest international standards, do justice to all the issues of maintaining the human rights and dignity of prisoners and make sure they have the appropriate conditions without spending a huge amount of money. That is why I have said on many occasions that this is and was always a long-term project. It is not something that will take care of the prison system requirements for the next two to three years, which is why in the interim we have been extending Wheatfield, Portlaoise and Castlerea prisons. They are the three locations where the 400 prison places have been made available and will come on-stream in the coming months. We were not taking everything for granted and waiting for Thornton Hall to come on-stream in the next year or two, even in 2005 when it was originally purchased. We should be given credit for not only dealing with the short term, but also for the long term and for future generations. Since Mountjoy was built, no Government has thought about this in the long term. We should be given credit for that.
Deputy Pat Rabbitte: Did I not hear the former Minister this morning, Michael McDowell, saying that it would be ready in 2010? Did the Minister not hear the piece played before he did the interview?
Deputy Dermot Ahern: I did, surely.
I am pleased the Minister has finally decided to outlaw the use of the samurai sword, which is a vicious implement. I cannot think of any other reason that a samurai sword would be brandished, other than to inflict injury on individuals. The swords are used as a macho badge of honour by males in this city and beyond. It is still possible to walk into a shop in this city, purchase a samurai sword and any array of deadly weapons for less than €100. The easy availability of these swords has facilitated some vicious crimes in recent years. One example was the brutal attack in a Finglas pub in 2008, when a man’s hand was sliced off in full view of the other customers.
Section 18 deals with the European arrest warrant, and it makes provision for arrest without warrant. If I understand it correctly, this provision will only become operational once the Schengen information system is put in place. It may be some time before this occurs. An important aspect of the Bill is the provision that allows the Garda Síochána the power to take fingerprints, photographs, and palm prints of persons arrested for comparison purposes with the European arrest warrant. Until now, the Garda Síochána could not do this and it will make the process more efficient. It is important that while the changes may enhance the operation of the European arrest warrant regime, we need at the same time to safeguard the rights of people whose surrender is sought on foot of the warrant.
Part 3 deals with the Schengen information system. Can the Minister advise us on our involvement in this? The European Commission indicated in 2007 that the central system would be ready by the end of 2008, but we are now mid-way into 2009. I know further issues emerged that need to be addressed before the system can become operational, but much of this Bill is dependent on the operation of the Schengen information system and our involvement therein. I would have thought that central to this involvement is the setting up of the DNA database here, which will be a key factor in improving the abysmal conviction rate in this country for serious crime. It is fundamental that all member states of the EU should maintain a DNA database and participate in sharing information on this. The Minister has indicated his intention to publish the legislation during this session, and I look forward to it. However, as in the Thornton Hall debacle, there are cost implications here. For example, how prepared is our “Pulse” system for participation in such an EU friendly database?
There are additional provisions in the Bill that I will not go into. This debate was scheduled to start earlier and there is further justice legislation to be dealt with, so I will come back to these issues on Committee Stage. They include the matter of firearms dealers with valid tax clearance certificates, the issue of imitation guns and the restriction of imitation sporting guns by using colour codes. I notice the Minister appears to have changed his mind on the issue of credit card skimming.