Walking down the corridor, footsteps hushed by the carpet, into the large pleasant office, it's difficult to believe this is a place where the possession of keys is paramount.
Here, in Wheatfield high-security prison, Clondalkin, Dublin, keys represent the right to freedom. The administration corridor - the preserve of key-holders - bears little resemblance to the tiled cells where the usual form of decoration is posters of large-chested women, with the occasional biker.
On his wall, Derek Tracy, the assistant governor, has a montage of photographs of prisoners with their community programme achievements. Above this is a row of cards, some from prisoners, others from their parents, all thanking Tracy for his help.
"The lesson we have learned is that keeping the link to the community is the big thing," says Tracy. "One project, a recreational garden for the mentally handicapped at Peamount Hospital was so successful it was named the garden of joy."
Wheatfield is home to 366 prisoners, aged 17 to 60 years, who have an average stay of six years. This is a place for those who have committed serious crimes, including sex offences. It's difficult to warm to someone who has been put away for a crime such as rape, murder or grevious bodily harm but, for Tracy and the staff of more than 300, the crime must be left at the prison gate.
The job now is to contain the prisoners for the time decreed by the courts and to "rehabilitate" them, although it's not a word he likes.
"There's a human side to every one of these lads," Tracy says. "You have to separate yourself from the crime. We're not here to punish people or to play judge. Our job is to maintain them in safe custody and keep them out of society as long as it dictates. It's our responsibility to help and support them. We shouldn't make monsters of them, as the American system does, because we must remember that every one of the 366 prisoners in here has a release date.
"It's no accident that most of the people in here come from deprived areas. I would assume that if my own children were born in these areas and their peers were driving around in stolen cars, so would they. Prisoners have had all sorts of social problems, from no money to take their girlfriends for a drink to ineffective parents.
"When I interview prisoners and ask them if they can read and write, they usually say yes. But if I give them a simple test, a lot fail badly. Prisoners are often labelled as failures - they fail at work, at home, at school, even at crime. That's why they're here."
Most of the prison's workshops offer courses that are nationally certified. If a prisoner learns a skill such as welding, he is more likely to have the confidence to tackle his literacy problems, says Tracy.
Wheatfield offers 13 activity areas, including computers, construction, painting, decoration, welding, printing, kitchen and laundries. I invited myself to lunch because Wheatfield's kitchens were joint overall winners of the supreme hygiene award in the National Hygiene Awards competition. As for lunch, it's savoury mince and roast potatoes followed by rice pudding. Good plain food. The menu changes in a 28-day cycle and a day's food costs less than £3 per person.
"It's no longer the meaningless mindbending activities like sewing up mailbags, with nobody noticing whether one, two or three sides were sewn up, or chopping wood. That was soul-destroying for staff and inmates," says Treacy. "There's a huge sense of pride now if an inmate receives a certificate. We placed more than 80 ex-prisoners in jobs this year."
But, for many, leaving prison can be a traumatising experience. "We let a lad out recently. He had got certificates, solved his heroin addiction within the walls, and got a job. He was out for four months. He had a bank account and a girlfriend. But he met an old mate on the way home from work one day. The mate offered him heroin. He took the old dose, but he had been clean for 12 months and it killed him. I had a telephone call from his employment support officer, who was in tears and incoherent. I thought her husband had died. She was devastated.
"I was shocked at how insensitive I had become. We have had so many deaths, not necessarily in here, but afterwards."
"I worked in Mountjoy until 1989, when Wheatfield opened. To my knowledge, all of the girls I knew in there (who were in their 20s then) are now dead, except, possibly, for one. My eldest lad is almost 25. When he was born, one of the girls in Mountjoy had a baby boy in the same week. I was full of the joys of parenthood and wondered if our paths would cross again.
"His mother died from drug-related causes when he was very small. Four years ago, when my young fella was in UCD, her young fella came to Wheatfield. My son graduated last year and is currently working in England; her son died a little over a year ago. My son was born into an ordinary family; her son was born into a crime family. He hadn't a hope."
Following a recent death, Tracy was prompted to look back at some recent records. On anecdotal evidence, at least 13 former prisoners had died, with a litany of violence claiming them, from joyriding to stabbing to shooting to overdoses. "Those are frightening figures . . . 13 young fellas in less than two years, all dead. None of these guys died in jail. Statistically, we're clean."
Tracy obviously feels an overwhelming responsibility. The support system for former prisoners needs to be strengthened, he says. "Next year, people will be going out facing the new currency. While they're locked up, society is changing: new roads, infrastructure, things we don't really notice because the picture is being drawn in front of out eyes. Prison can be like living in one country and then being released into another country."
But prison is not just for people who live in certain postal districts. "It's easy to have a lock-them-up-and-throw-away-the-key mentality about prisoners - but there's a human story to every crime. Take John [not his real name], a small-time businessman in the 1970s. He knew nothing about crime or jail. He and his wife had a couple of kids.
"Then one of his friends called to tell John that his eldest daughter was working as a prostitute in Leeson Street. John was disbelieving, but he and his friend went out and found his daughter there. They got her into the car, brought her home, locked her up in her bedroom. She was on heroin. At 15, a pusher had given her free drugs for a while, then introduced her to pornography to pay for the drugs. And then he introduced her to prostitution.
She was absolutely desperate. She could only pay off the interest on the loan. "John did what most parents would have done. He found out the name of the pusher and went to the flats to confront him. He took a shotgun, threatened the guy. A fight ensued. John panicked and shot him. He got life, which was commuted to four years.
"His marriage fell apart. His daughter is HIV positive. When he got out, he committed suicide. John knew nothing about crime, but his life was destroyed by it. His daughter had appeared in court on many occasions on drug-related instances. It's easy to say she's a drug pusher."
The female prison warder on the security gates who suggests the prison is like an amalgam of a boys' boarding school and a hospital isn't far off. However, the institutional feel is overshadowed by the amount of time a prisoner spends locked up, alone in a cell. Prisoners are usually out of their cells for three periods: 9.30 a.m. to noon, 2.30 p.m. to 4.15 p.m. and 5.30 p.m. to 7.15 p.m.
When the door clangs shut and a prisoner has nothing but a narrow bed, a sink, a flush toilet, a TV (£1 a week), posters, clothes and his own mental resources to fall back on, it's like nowhere else.
And it's not a place you want to be, unless you're in possession of the keys.