‘Over the winter, we make these protectors to stop the rabbits from getting in,” explains Officer Kieran Gavigan, horticultural work training officer at the Midlands prison.

I look over and point the dictaphone – in the spilling rain – at the 20ft high walls surrounding us.

“We are the same as every other garden; we have the same pests and problems to deal with!” he laughs as I picture tiny rabbits bettering the substantial construction that encloses the Ireland’s largest prison.

We are standing in a garden that could very well be in the National Botanic Gardens or the Phoenix Park. It is manicured, it is colourful and the lawns are immaculate.

Prison has had a presence in Portlaoise life from the late 1700s, when the Maryborough gaol was located on the site of the current arts centre; just behind the town courthouse.

Moving out to the Dublin road in the 1830s, the dark grey walls of Portlaoise prison – as it became known – has been a landmark on this straight stretch of road ever since.

Today, Portlaoise prison is the high security prison closest to the town. Its neighbour, the Midlands prison, where we are visiting, opened in 2000. It is the committal prison for Portlaoise court and surrounding counties. Some men spend a few months here, some longer. Currently, there are between 900 to 1,000 people serving time at the Midlands.

Since opening, however, horticulture workshops have been taking place behind the walls. Each year, like most gardeners, they add something new. After 20 years, these are impressive, secluded grounds to walk around.

“Last year, we bought €100 worth of daffodil bulbs and sowed them along that wall,” says Officer John Donoghue, a fellow horticultural work training officer, as he points over to a south-facing wall.

“As they begin to produce stems, we’ll send them across to the Cuisle Centre [local cancer support service] for Daffodil Day every year.”

A word from the chief

“My thing is that we are a community within a community,” says the chief officer of work training, Joyce Clarke.

“Even though the guys are currently not in the community in the main, they – everyone – within the prison service, are a community within a community,” she continues.

“We work and live in the communities surrounding the prison and the surrounding counties – and these guys will return to their communities – and it is about giving them the best possible chance to go back out in to their own communities when they leave here.”

In the garden where we are standing, 38 to 40 men are part of this workshop. There are 30 prisoners currently engaging in horticulture training – once these QQI qualifications are secured, there will be no mention of where the qualification was obtained on the certificate.

“We have a very strong emphasis on upskilling and preparing for release,” says deputy governor of the Midlands, Mike O’Mahoney.

“People come in here for whatever reason and we see it as our mission: ‘Ok, let’s give these guys skills.’”

It is not just the gardens that are focused on growth.

Waste not, want not

Currently, 88% of the workshops available are open to prisoners at the Midlands. Over 300 men engage in structured activities every day.

Workshops generally open at 9:15am and run until just after noon. They then continue in the afternoons from 2 – 4pm.

Services provided within the prison are laundry, industrial cleaning, waste management and the kitchen.

Over 3,000 meals are prepared inside every day with prisoners working alongside staff, preparing the food, and all the food waste goes back out to the composting bays. The horticultural team are currently working out the best soil-to-compost ratios for the gardens.

“You can take it that anything you see here, is made here,” says Officer Clarke proudly.

The hanging baskets and brackets, the planters, the garden tables and benches are all made in the building skills workshops – where metal work, tiling, carpentry, stone masonry and carving and retro-fitting is carried out.

A memorial stone that is a work in progress catches my eye.

“That is for Sr Breda who used to work here. We all loved her, she was very much part of this place,” says Officer Clarke.

“There will be a memorial soccer week soon with the teams playing for a cup and shield in her memory,” she adds.

A cup and shield that will be engraved in the engraving workshop upstairs, while the soccer commentary will go out on the prison’s podcast and in-house TV channel.

“Can we tune in for that?” asks Claire, our photographer, and myself excitedly at the same time.

“No, that is our own in-house station,” replies Officer Clarke with a smile.

“One of our officers is a DJ, so he delivers a DJ course and set up the podcast and TV channel. The prisoners are guests and there is GAA and soccer commentary when matches are on.”

Beyond the walls

It is not just the inside that reaps the benefits of these skills.Working with Tidy Towns around Laois and Kildare, Happy to Chat benches were made and distributed to towns where prisoners are from.

Pallets are a valuable commodity inside, with benches, tables, chairs, decorative windmills and wheelbarrows made out of them by the carpentry team. The off-cuts are bagged up and given to local charities for kindling.

A local school is delighted with their new bicycle racks made by the metal work lads and, on our visit, the finishing touches were being put to a shiny red train just in time for the Durrow Scarecrow Festival.

But back to the gardening…

“This is the top level in the Midlands,” emphasises Officer Gavigan.

“It is the top workshop to get to; it is the longest time out of the cell, it is the one out in the fresh air, it is the one where you get to eat the strawberries; the tomatoes off the plants. D’you know what I am saying?

“That is the privilege; you won’t get that inside on the landing.”

For lads with no gardening background, there might be an initial reluctance to join up, but once they get out, they don’t want to go back indoors.

Getting out into the garden, any enthusiast will rave about the peace, purpose and the sense of accomplishment that even a few minutes working the soil will produce. For the men in the Midlands, the horticultural workshop offers them routine and normality of being outdoors. There are young lads from their early 20s up to men in their 80s here.

“There is fierce banter going on between them; a great education. The older men showing the younger lads how to tend the vegetables,” says Officer Gavigan.

“Some mornings they’d come out and tell us about the blight warnings in place, or they would be watching the rain water if a dry spell is forecast.”

We walk past a team pinning strawberry runners so they have a continuous supply for next year.

My mind wanders at how idyllic this is – spending a morning tending to plants is therapy for anyone, surely.

Then I hear keys jangling.

“Security is our number one priority,” emphasises Officer Clarke. “Everything is risk assessed.”

I am brought back to reality; and remember exactly where I am.

“I come from a farming background and it is a long way from calving!” says Officer Donoghue, who has worked in three prisons and enjoys the variety of the job.

“I was working in landscaping for 15 years,” adds Officer Gavigan, “and the contractor had a contract with the Prison Service, so that was how I came in here and saw the work that was going on. I never knew anyone that worked in the prisons, never knew anything about it. That is what encouraged me to apply and that is how I ended up here. That was the aim – to get to here, working on these projects.”