Women in Irish Prisons
By Elizabeth Kiely*
It should really shock us that the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment after visiting the women’s prisons in Ireland had sufficient reason to remind the Irish Authorities that ‘Any force used on a pregnant woman must be appropriate, justified and proportionate, other less invasive and de-escalation techniques should always be resorted to first.’
The 57% surge in the global female prison population since 2000 is worthy of our concern and particularly when the growth in the rate of female detention is far outstripping that of male detention. Unfortunately, it is a growth driven by systemic inequalities, punitive laws, harsh drug policies, the criminalization of poverty and other marginal statuses in so many country contexts.
Punishing Women on the Margins
In Ireland, the two prisons (Dόchas and Limerick Prison) housing women are chronically overcrowded. On the 24th November 2025, Dόchas was at 162% capacity and Limerick prison was at 166%. Most of the women there have committed minor offences and serve short sentences. Profiles of women in prison in Ireland show that they are predominantly poor, have drug addictions, mental illness, experience of violence, homelessness and repeated short prison sentences.
When the EU Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment visited Dόchas in 2024, it expressed its concerns about mentally distressed women as well as pregnant women sleeping on mattresses on the prison floor. The mentally ill women in the prison the committee encountered, lacked access to showers, exercise and meaningful activity and the kind of therapeutic environment that they really needed.
Disturbing realities
It is difficult to understand why women sent to prison in Ireland serve their time in high-secure, closed prisons rather than open prisons. It is also depressing to think that the high level of detention of women pre-trial and the high level of detention for non-payment of fines persist without any meaningful policy efforts being taken to address these factors.
The most disturbing aspect is that some women imprisoned in Ireland fear the end of the prison sentence because it means a return to homelessness, abuse and desperation. This fear is real when we consider that research conducted on media reporting of court cases in Cork city between 2020 and 2024 showed that just over half the women, who received a prison sentence for theft, had addiction issues and an address with Cork Simon homeless shelter, or they were of no fixed address. When we read in the media that women with addresses in homeless shelters receive short sentences for shoplifting alcohol and that they have previous convictions for theft and considerable prison experience already, why would we ever think that more prison is the answer?
A different approach
Instead of providing more prison places for women, why doesn’t the Irish government fund a scheme of proactive police and court diversion for women from criminal justice, complemented by dedicated stable accommodation provision, bail support and a suite of women-centred wrap around and throughcare services and supports? This investment is possible if significant financial resources are not wasted on prison spaces and if there is the political will to disrupt the incarceration of so many vulnerable women. Why not take inspiration from Manitoba’s Bail Programme? Why not adopt the woman centred community-based approach that was advocated in Britain in the Corston Report 2007 and practiced by Enrich Project operated by Alana House or Inspire by Brighton Women’s Centre? Crimes of misery and survival should make women targets for care, not custody. So, let’s not keep putting women behind bars and instead fund meaningful community initiatives.
*Liz Kiely is …
Elizabeth Kiely is an…
IPAN member, is a Professor of Social Policy in University College Cork. Her research in the field of penal policy is concerned with the criminalisation of social policy including poverty, welfare dystopia, the pervasiveness of punitive logics in justice and prisons as necropolitical spaces.
