All in-person visits to prisons after Christmas Eve cancelled

All in-person visits to Irish prisons that were due to take place after Christmas Eve have been cancelled and must be rescheduled as video calls, the Irish Prison Service has said.

The announcement came following the Government’s decision on Tuesday to reimpose Level 5 restrictions due to the rapidly rising numbers of Covid-19 cases.

The prison service said all physical visits to prisons would be suspended from midnight on Thursday, December 24th and that any visits which had been arranged for over Christmas had been cancelled. It advised family members who were scheduled to visit after Christmas Eve not to travel to see their loved ones but to contact the prison in question to rebook a video slot.

“We regret that we must cancel these visits and understand that many families will be disappointed however, we will continue to make video visits available during this time and all prisoners have been granted an additional daily phone call,” the IPS said in a statement.

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It had been announced earlier this month that prisoners in Irish jails would be permitted one visit each over the Christmas and New Year period with a maximum of two visitors per visit.

The Irish Prison Service has tightly controlled all prison campuses since the Covid-19 pandemic started and put in place a series of precautions including the early release of some prisoners in a bid to create additional capacity for prisoners suspected of having Covid-19 to quarantine.

All in-person visits to jails were suspended in March and replaced with video-conference calls. In-person visits resumed at the end of July before being suspended again at the beginning of October.