Provisional Irish Republican Army 1982, reflecting the sequence in which the old leadership of the republican movement were being sidelined. IRA prisoners convicted after March 1976 did not have Special Category Status applied in prison. In response, more than 500 prisoners refused to wear prison clothes. This activity culminated in the 1981 Irish hunger strike, when seven IRA and three Irish National Liberation Army members starved themselves to death in pursuit of political status. The hunger strike leader Bobby Sands and Anti H-Block activist Owen Carron were elected to the British Parliament, and two other protesting prisoners were elected to the Dáil. In addition,
Irish Prison Service Irish Prison Service The Irish Prison Service (IPS) () manages the day-to-day operation of prisons in the Republic of Ireland. Political responsibility for the Ireland's prisons rests with the Minister of the Department of Justice and Equality. As of 2018, the Irish Prison Service oversees 13 facilities with an official capacity of 4,269, and a total population of 3,992, including pretrial detainees. Among all prisoners, 4.6% are female, 16.7% are pretrial detainees, and 1.0% are under the age of 18. In 2018, the Irish Prison Service had an annual budget of €327.37 million and it had a staff of 3,186