Select Committee on Northern Ireland Affairs Written Evidence


Written evidence from Gregory Campbell MP

  The first issue is the land availability question. There appears to be sufficient land in the Prison Estate's ownership at Magilligan to build a new purpose built Prison. This would not be the case in any site at Antrim/Ballymena. This could raise considerable cost differentials but in addition any Antrim/Ballymena site would almost certainly lead to significant neighbourhood objections in connection with any new Prison site usage and prolonged planning appeal delays. None of this would be applicable to a rebuild project at Magilligan, and the present buildings are urgently in need of replacement.

  The Prison generates approximately £13 million into the local economy and while this would not be a direct consideration for any Prisons Report by the Committee it does have a bearing on the significantly lower socio-economic profile of the population on the North Coast compared to the Antrim/Ballymena area. Any move to Antrim/Ballymena would generate additional costs in relation to assisted travel for staff over a three year period following the move, this would not be the case for Magilligan.

  Any move to Antrim/Ballymena would mean that all three locations for holding offenders from all of Northern Ireland would be within a 25 mile radius of Greater Belfast. This would then mean that those offenders whose residence is in an area where 300,000 people live in the North West of Northern Ireland would have no Prison within their catchment area.

  The Prison Service has a workforce which is predominantly Protestant, while the reasons for this had much to do with a terror campaign over 30 years it will undoubtedly come under pressure now that the violence hopefully is past, to recruit from the community in a manner that will produce a more balanced workforce. The Limavady Council area is 56% Roman Catholic, while Ballymena and Antrim Council areas are 21% and 38% Roman Catholic respectively. Assuming a recruitment policy based on merit, then those appointed would be in close approximation to the numbers in the local community. This would inevitably mean that a Magilligan site (with its more mixed local population) offers a much better prospect of progressively achieving a more balanced workforce than either of the other two sites.

  The excellent work being done by a number of prisoners in the local community (through Foyleview etc.) and the growing liaison between the existing Prison and the local Higher Education campus would be undermined by a Magilligan closure while conversely a new build on site would offer the opportunity to enhance further the present work being done in these areas.

Gregory Campbell MP

July 2007





 
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