A PRISON officer earned £29,600 in overtime and another received £25,000 compensation for an injury caused by being hit by a football, the Oireachtas Public Accounts Committee was told yesterday.
The committee was also told the State funded two Garda representative associations, the Garda Representative Association and Association of Garda Sergeants and Inspectors, to a total of £257,666 in 1994, on top of the subscriptions paid by their members.
The subvention to the associations was "unique" among the public service staff associations. The additional money paid to the Garda associations had not prevented an "unsavoury" dispute between the GRA and a breakaway group, the Garda Federation, Mr Eric Byrne TD (DL) commented.
A review of prison service finances was being undertaken amid concern about rising costs and high wage bills, the Secretary of the Department of Justice told the committee. Mr Tim Dalton said compensation of £25,599, mentioned among miscellaneous items in prison accounts, was paid to a prison officer in Cork who was hit by a football while on duty. A total of £188,337 in compensation was paid to 18 officers. One officer in Portlaoise received £10,000 after he "slipped on the floor", Mr Dalton said.
The committee drew Mr Dalton's attention to the details of "extra remuneration" paid to prison officers. The total amount for additional duties, overtime, extra attendance, shift and roster allowances was over £29 million.
Mr Dalton told Mr Byrne one assistant chief officer received £29,600 in overtime. His total salary for 1994 was £56,000, he said. The next highest prison officer salary was £53,000, he said.
Mr Byrne said it was disturbing to learn people "would be earning around £30,000 in overtime when this would could pay the salary of an additional staff member". The average cost to the State of keeping a person in prison was given as £42,000.
To deal with the problem of overcrowding in prisons, a senior" Department official had to decide each evening which prisoners would be freed on early temporary release.
The present prison population was 2,143 and there was accommodation for 2,174. The unused space was mostly in Portlaoise high security prison where the remaining paramilitary prisoners are being held. It was proposed that these men would be transferred to the new prison at Castlerea, allowing an additional 80 spaces in Portlaoise.
There were 360 sex offenders who were not allowed temporary release and this was "creating huge problems" in the system. "The amount of space is reducing all the time," Mr Dalton said.
However, he added that newspaper reports claiming "gourmet" food was being served to inmates was "mythology". It cost only £3.13 to supply a day's meals for a prisoner. The prisons baked their own bread and grew most of their own vegetables. Mr Dalton agreed with Mr Tommy Broughan (Lab) that the prisons served "good wholesome food". He said "Yes, I have eaten prison food, not because I was a prisoner. I went to see what it was like."
He estimated around 40 per cent of people in prison were addicts or serious drug abusers and some began abusing drugs while in prison. Steps were being taken to reduce drug abuse in prisons and a drugs free unit was being set up in Mountjoy.