Travellers are loose threads in the fabric of Irish society. They exist at the edges rather than being interwoven into the whole. This is often excused by settled people as being their choice, and even their fault. We have all heard about, and read about in the media, Travellers’ propensity to crime and disruption. But what we don’t hear about is Travellers’ struggles to exist and find their place in a society that was designed for a settled lifestyle.

A decision on parole for an applicant is to take into account that the parole applicant “has been rehabilitated and would, upon being released, be capable of reintegrating into society.”[13] However, the 2019 Act does not contain a definition of rehabilitation, or how it is to be measured, so both parole applicants and Parole Board members may be in the dark as to the basis on which decisions are to be made in terms of rehabilitation, despite the several other factors on which their decision is made being based in law. The Act creates legal uncertainty about rehabilitation by omitting to define it.

“Advise, assist and befriend” was first introduced into the Irish probation lexicon under the Probation of Offenders Act 1907 which was enacted prior to Ireland’s independence from Britain. Section 4 of the Act provides that the probation officer must ensure that the person under supervision abides by the terms of their order and in doing so is required to “advise, assist and befriend” them. 

I have suggested that rehabilitation is a noble pursuit because it is a creative act and requires vision and imagination. But these insightful essays, taken as a whole illustrate that rehabilitation is an act of hope.

The determined efforts and commitment of Prison Chaplains in the difficult working environment of prisons is clearly evident. While the support of the Irish Prison Service for chaplaincy is regularly acknowledged, the annual reports also highlight shortcomings within the prison system and the wider criminal justice system. 

Reading these essays, the threads that interconnect the different elements of care in our society are clear. When you lack care for one aspect of existence it is easy to imagine this seeping into all other areas.

The distinction of the Irish pastoral penal policy was, first, the prisoner was viewed not as a defective person with skewed attitude and amoral values. Instead, they were understood as someone who most likely had fallen on hard times, crime was seen as a result of poverty and a lack of opportunity, which was felt to be endemic in Ireland. There was empathy with the prisoner.

It does not work to replace ‘paying your debts’ with ‘repairing the harm’, then. Drawing on the work of penal theorist Antony Duff, we suggest the metaphor of “fulfilling a civic obligation” as an alternative tool to guide our responses to crime. Duff argues that, done very differently, “criminal punishment could and should be inclusionary, as something we can do, not to a ‘them’ who are implicitly excluded from the (law-abiding) community of citizens, but to ourselves as full, if imperfect, members of that community.”[15]

Jesuit Centre for Faith and Justice · Confines, Wards And Dungeons “Denmark’s a prison”, says Hamlet in Shakespeare’s play. “Then is the world one”, Rosencrantz responds. To which Hamlet replies: “A goodly one; in which there are many confines, wards and dungeons.” The analogy between a given society – or even the world – and… Read more »

Beth Duane INTRODUCTION Prison life in Ireland is not exempt from crime. While the common belief holds that a person receiving a custodial sentence will be stripped of opportunities to commit crime, research has shown that this is not always the case. Although little is known about the prevalence of crime in Irish prisons, violence… Read more »