15th July 2010
In today's Irish Times, Carol Coulter, Legal Affairs Editor, reports on and offers an analysis of the implications of the judgement in Mulligan v. Portlaoise Prison:
"The High Court judgment finding that slopping out in Portlaoise Prison did not violate a prisoner’s constitutional rights does not give the Government the green light to continue the practice. It indicated that in another case, with other facts, the outcome might be different."
She adds:
"The judgment gives a graphic and disturbing description of the system of slopping out, whereby the prisoners have to urinate and defecate into a small pot, sleep with the contents overnight, have no access to running water to wash their hands and then must walk publicly with the contents to a sluice area the next day."
Of course, the situation in Portlaoise Prison, while unacceptable, is less horrific than in Mountjoy and Cork Prisons. In these - chronically overcrowded - prisons, adult men are living in multiple occupancy cells, often under 23-hour lock up, and eating their meals in the same cells. Indeed, the Inspector of Prisons noted in his 2009 report on the inspection of Mountjoy, that he had observed 7 men sharing 3 buckets in one cell.
Slopping out is inhumane and degrading and it must stop.
Read more:
Respect for rights in the penal system with prison as a last resort.