The work of IPRT is led by a number of standards developed by international bodies, organisations and courts in relation to imprisonment and wider issues of the State’s penal policy. In particular, our work is based on the commitment to implement in Ireland a human rights-based approach to penal policy.
With this in mind, IPRT’s research, policy and awareness-raising campaigns are developed to support and monitor the implementation in the context of penal policy in Ireland of the United Nations and Council of Europe standards.
The IPRT is also committed to the promotion of best practice examples that have proved effective in other jurisdictions. To this end, we aim to provide a comprehensive library of good practices that can be accessed and used by practitioners, academics, prisoners, and anyone else interested in penal reform and penal policy. The Library is updated on a regular basis to take into account most recent developments in this area.
19th June 2018
The Prison Reform Trust (PRT) and Women in Prison (WiP) have published a report entitled ‘Home truths: housing for women in the criminal justice system'.
14th June 2018
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has published a booklet entitled 'Ageing and Detention', which seeks to draw attention to the needs of older detainees.
25th May 2018
The Ministry of Justice recently published an Analytical Summary examining the reoffending impact of short-term custodial and court order sentences on different groups of offenders.
15th May 2018
Penal Reform International (PRI) has published the 2018 edition of 'Global Prison Trends'.
25th January 2018
Youth Justice Statistics for 2016/2017 published by the Youth Justice Board and the Ministry of Justice.
17th December 2017
The latest edition of the Prison Reform Trust's Bromley Briefings Prison Factfile provides extensive facts and figures on a wide range of key areas within the UK prison system.
4th December 2017
Prison Reform Trust (2017) “There’s a reason we’re in trouble” Domestic abuse as a driver to women’s offending.
14th November 2017
The Campbell Collaboration released a fourth Policy Brief, 'The Effects of Sentencing Policy on Re-offending', which summarises information provided in 12 systematic reviews that focused on different aspects of sentencing policy, such as, benefit-cost analyses of sentencing, formal processing of juveniles, and effects on re-offending of custodial vs non-custodial sanctions.
9th November 2017
The Institute for Criminal Research published the fourth edition of the World Female Imprisonment List, providing a comprehensive report on the number of women and girls in penal institutions worldwide.
27th October 2017
The current system for disclosure of youth criminal records undermines the principles of the youth justice system, says the Justice Committee in a new report published today, 27 October 2017.
Respect for rights in the penal system with prison as a last resort.