Every Friday evening in Waterford, several former prisoners meet for a few hours to talk about their shared experiences. They are young but almost all are veterans of the country's network of detention institutions.
Their weekly talks are the genesis of an idea that is already helping some of them to change their lives. They call their group STOP (Straight Talk On Prisons) and its primary aim is to help its members stay out of jail.
Noel is 27 years old and knows the inside of almost all the Republic's detention centres, correction institutions and prisons. He has spent almost half his life locked up, but has managed to stay out of trouble for the last two years.
STOP continues to help him do that, and is now extending similar help to other young ex-prisoners. "The few lads who come here, we've all done the same thing and we can talk about it easily," he says, explaining how it is important for them to discuss their predicament without encountering stigma, prejudice or suspicion.
"This can work. It's a simple thing that has started small," says the originator of STOP, Mr Gerry O'Mahony, a Customs and Excise official. He lived in a housing estate where he met many local young men caught up in a cycle of crime and imprisonment. He believed something should be done to help them.
"STOP is a self-help support group," he says. "They come along to listen and share their hopes and fears and anxieties. It is important for them to be able to get it all out of their heads first of all, to get rid of all the negativity. It takes time."
Gerry does not sit in on the meetings; only ex-prisoners may take part. But he has longer-term ambitions for the group. "Eventually we should be able to place them in jobs. But we need support. At present we haven't even got a phone."
He believes that business people and employers should see that it is in their interests, as well as a moral duty, to take some part in the project: "If boys or girls are prepared to come here and try to turn their lives around, the business community should rally round."
STOP also needs to draw in more ex-prisoners. It was recently allowed to send a delegation into Mountjoy to spread the word about its existence and its work, and it is also anxious that probation officers should begin referring former prisoners to the group.
Noel admits he hated being deprived of his freedom, but says that somehow he kept doing "stupid things" that landed him back in prison. The support group, with its simple, non-judgmental forum, has helped him break the cycle, for the present at least. "STOP means a lot to me. Only for it I don't think I'd be here. I'd be doing another sentence," he says.
With his experience of the group therapy process, he gains purpose and focus by working individually with other ex-prisoners.
There are a couple of similar, but larger and more established projects, in Dublin. But Waterford up to now had no support services to help its many former prisoners. Noel and others concede that there are worthwhile educational programmes in place in the country's prisons, but assert that they are of little benefit if the support services are not on the outside.
The STOP group meets every Friday between 8 p.m. and 10 p.m. at the former Manor School in Manor Street, Waterford.