233.—(1) The Minister may make rules (in this Act referred to as rules for military prisons and detention barracks) for all or any of the following purposes, that is to say:—

(a) the government, management and regulation of military prisons and detention barracks;

(b) the appointment and removal and power of inspectors, visitors, governors and officers thereof;

(c) the labour of military prisoners and men undergoing detention therein;

(d) enabling such prisoners or men to earn, by special industry and good conduct, a remission of portion of their sentence;

(e) the classification of military prisoners and men undergoing detention;

(f) the safe custody of such prisoners or men, and the maintenance of discipline among them, and the punishment by personal correction, restraint or otherwise of offences committed by such prisoners or men;

(g) the temporary release, in such cases, for such periods and subject to such conditions as may be prescribed by the rules, of such prisoners or men.

(2) Rules under this section shall not authorise corporal punishment to be inflicted for any offence nor render the imprisonment or detention more severe than it is, under the law in force for the time being, in any public prison.

F369[(2A) Any power conferred by rules under this section to release a person temporarily shall not, in the case of a person serving a sentence passed on him on conviction of treason or of murder, or attempted murder, to which section 3 of the Criminal Justice Act 1990 applies, be exercisable before the expiration of the minimum period specified by the court-martial under section 4 of that Act, as applied by section 169A of this Act, less any reduction of that period by the amount of remission earned by the person according to the rules of practice whereby prisoners generally earn remission of sentence by industry and good conduct, unless for grave reasons of a humanitarian nature, and any such release shall only be of such limited duration as is justified by those reasons.]

(3) Where any person has been temporarily released from a military prison or detention barrack in accordance with rules made under this section the currency of any sentence which he may be serving shall be suspended for the period commencing on the day after the day on which he was released and ending on the day on which he returns to the prison or detention barrack or is otherwise taken into custody under subsection (4) of this section.

(4) If any person who has been temporarily released from a military prison or detention barrack in accordance with rules made under this section fails to comply with any of the conditions subject to which he was released or to return at the expiration of the period for which he was released—

(a) he may be arrested without warrant by any member of the Garda Síochána or taken into service custody, and may be kept in custody, whether civil or service, until he is taken back to the military prison or detention barrack,

(b) unless proceedings are taken against him under section 135 or 137, he shall be liable to such punishment as may be prescribed by the rules.

(5) Rules under this section shall provide for applying, with such modifications and adaptations as the Minister thinks proper, in respect of military prisons and detention barracks, the provisions relating to the duties of medical officers contained in section 74 of the Prisons (Ireland) Act, 1826, and sections 52 and 53 of the General Prisons (Ireland) Act, 1877, and the provisions relating to the duties of gaolers contained in section 54 of the said General Prisons (Ireland) Act, 1877.

(6) Every rule made under this section shall be laid before each House of the Oireachtas as soon as may be after such rule is made and, if a resolution annulling such rule is passed by either House of the Oireachtas within the next subsequent twenty-one days on which that House has sat after such rule is so laid before it, such rule shall be annulled accordingly, but without prejudice to the validity of anything previously done under such rule.