Pádraig Mac Lochlainn (Donegal North East, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

There is a predictable pattern to these statements. Obviously, the Opposition will express criticism and deal with our concerns and the Government Ministers and backbenchers will speak to the virtues of the Minister and so on. I will get that out of the way first. The Minister has been extremely hard working and has brought through a large amount of legislation. In the main, he is progressive and it is a pity about this entire debacle bearing in mind the programme of work he has done and wishes to do in the future. That is not the point. That is agreed. Nobody denies that the Minister is hard working or that much of the legislation he has introduced is admirable and needed to happen. That is not the point.

The second issue relates to An Garda Síochána, which has more than 13,000 members. Deputy Charles Flanagan is right in pointing out that we have a police service and I am glad he made the distinction from a police force. We all need to start using the term "police service" in future. Our police service is unique in that it is so close to our communities. There is no one in this House who has not played football or had conversations when we have left our children to school with a member of An Garda Síochána. Many of us have served on local community committees with them. It is a very admirable service. The vast majority of the men and women of An Garda Síochána are honourable, decent and hard-working people who have done no wrong.

All of these controversies are a let-down to them because a garda pulling over a motorist today to give penalty points is the one taking the flak for all this. A garda investigating matters and trying to do his or her job is the person taking the flak on the front line. The people who have been failed most are the members of An Garda Síochána and some of the families caught up in these various controversies. Also impacted, sadly, is the Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission.

The people to have failed the members of An Garda Síochána most are their senior management. That senior management has made the errors and not dealt properly with the matters coming before it. That is indisputable. I also believe the Minister has not handled these matters as he should have.

I listened to the Minister's speech today. He is entitled to give a defence of himself as he did on a range of matters. He is also entitled to raise the previous Administration's handling of these matters. However, I was alarmed about two issues. First, he did not even deal with the issue of the sacking of the confidential recipient and the transcript of the comments made that have given rise to major questions in the public domain. The sacking of the confidential recipient was a major development and it is remarkable that the Minister found it unnecessary to touch on it in his 30-minute speech.

The second area about which I was alarmed was the Minister's return to the issue of Sergeant Maurice McCabe not co-operating and his inability to deal finally with that issue. It is very clear that the assistant commissioner, John O'Mahony, did not make any effort to go to the person in question. Can we imagine if gardaí were investigating any alleged crime and they did not go to see the witness, the person who made the report? Can the Minister imagine any scenario where a member of An Garda Síochána investigating a very simple crime or allegation would not go to the person who made it? The assistant commissioner, John O'Mahony, has confirmed that he did not knock on the door of Sergeant Maurice McCabe. He did not text, ring, call, e-mail or make any attempt to go to the people who made the allegations. If, as the Garda Commissioner apparently suggested, he gave an order to Sergeant Maurice McCabe to co-operate, why was Sergeant Maurice McCabe not disciplined? When the Minister famously went out on the plinth after the publication of the O'Mahony report back in May 2013, he strongly criticised the whistleblowers that day but why did he not refer to the fact that they did not co-operate if that was the issue for him? Why did the assistant commissioner, John O'Mahony, go to the station in which Sergeant McCabe serves and interview personnel but not see fit to talk to Sergeant McCabe? It is clear and patently obvious that they did not want to talk to Sergeant McCabe.

When An Garda Síochána was dealing with the cold case review of the Fr. Niall Molloy case, the journalist, Gemma O'Doherty, whose immense work almost definitely led to that review, was not questioned by the team doing that cold case review. We have a culture where people who have made allegations, done the work and put their concerns about important matters of public interest in the public domain, or by whatever channel is necessary, are not even interviewed. It is indefensible. It is nonsense. The Minister should have apologised today on the record.

I wish to ask the Minister, who is engaged in a conversation, a question. Has he had a chance to review the transcript issued by Sergeant Maurice McCabe - a statement read out by the Commissioner - around the visit by a Garda chief superintendent on behalf of the Garda Commissioner? I will ask him this question later on, as I appreciate he cannot answer it now, but I ask him to think about it and I will revisit it later. Anyone who would read that chief superintendent's transcript of a conversation would see that it was an order to Sergeant Maurice McCabe to stay silent, not to use PULSE, not to co-operate with third parties and that there was no order for him to go out and immediately co-operate with the investigation. It is incredible that the people who were dealing with the allegations, who made them and who had gone through the process were not interviewed about all that. I cannot understand how the Minister cannot see that but there we are.

In terms of the three episodes that are in the public domain, one is the issue of the penalty points debacle. To recap on this briefly, two Garda whistleblowers went to the confidential recipient, felt they were apparently being stonewalled after months of inaction and then took their concerns to the Road Safety Authority, the Comptroller and Auditor General, Government Departments and to a Dáil Deputy, as is their right under the law. The Minister then settled for an internal Garda investigation. The report of the internal Garda investigation, published in May 2013 after a period of six months, is now seen to have minimised the scale of what was being reported. Months later, the Comptroller and Auditor General's report pretty much vindicates the concern about the scale of the problem. That was the core complaint from the Garda whistleblowers - the scale of what was happening, the amount of loss revenue and the other issues related to road safety. The matter found its way into the Committee of Public Accounts. The Commissioner infamously came before it and made comments that he thought the behaviour of these whistleblowers was disgusting. Then it turns into a crisis and after almost two years and after all of that, the Minister finally refers it to the Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission, an independent arena. That was badly handled. The Minster must see that was badly handled throughout.

The second issue is that of the confidential recipient, the sacking of Oliver Connolly. With regard to the transcript, why would he say what he said? Where did he get that from? Apparently, he is an honourable man. The Minister said so himself when he appointed him. He is a respected solicitor. His character is not in question. Why would somebody like that say what he said? That must be answered.

The third issue is the alleged bugging of the offices of GSOC, how that was handled and how GSOC was put in the dock rather than given the support of the Minister's office. What the Minister demonstrated in his handling of all three issues, because of his unhealthily close relationship with the Garda Commissioner, is that his instinct was to circle the wagons and not to get to the truth of the allegations and, in some cases, to discredit those who were making the allegations or to undermine them. The Minister has handled all three issues badly in the way he has dealt with them and the way the Garda Commissioner has dealt with them. That is why the more than 13,000 members of the Garda Síochána are under pressure, and this has impacted on their morale which has been impacted on already by cutbacks and everything else they have faced in recent years.

Why did the Minister not avail of the Commissions of Investigations Act 2004? There is probably no Member of this House more expert on, au fait with, knowledgeable and capable of dealing with the legislation. He must know that legislation is almost custom-made for scenarios like we are facing now, that it would have been the legislation to use to compel witnesses, compel the production of relevant documentation and make findings of fact. Why is it that we have instead gone for a review in regard to the bugging of the offices of GSOC and another review by Sean Guerin SC? I will give these questions to the Minister. Why did he not use that legislation rather than take the option of a review in these cases?

There is a lot of thinking for the Minister to do. I hope these episodes will be learned from and that more powers will be given to the Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission. There needs to be, and we have engaged in discussion on this, an independent policing authority in this State, similar to the arrangement in the north of Ireland, that is accountable to the Oireachtas, accountable to an independent policing authority representative and accountable to joint policing committees. That is where we need to get to. We need to see serious change to learn lessons from all that has happened and then the Minister can get on with the other work, on which I have commended him.

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