Clare Daly (Dublin North, Socialist Party) | Oireachtas source

It is important, as this is the witnesses first time to formally come before this committee, to put some of the issues on the record. It is unfortunate that this meeting has taken place at a messy time of year where we are in the middle of much ado about nothing in the committee room next door and in terms of many other votes and all the rest of it.

I am conscious of what Deputy Healy Rae said in terms of why the witnesses are not giving out more. I am conscious of the fact that the steps they have taken already have put this issue very much centre stage. In some ways they have been involved in a quiet revolution in putting the message into the public domain that all is not well. That is hugely important and they would have been negligent if they had not done that. I appreciate it is very much an usual step for a public body to have to take, which indicates the seriousness of the issue. I understand why they have done that and I very much compliment them on it. It is quite a radical step.

I agree with the witnesses that it is difficult to change culture. I do not know what has been their experience but I presume nobody would go to the ombudsman commission with a complaint first off. Presumably it is the case that in respect of the majority of complaints the first step is that the person would go to the local Garda station to try to resolve the problem and it is only when people encounter a problem there and do not perceive that the complaint is being taken seriously or consider there is a cover up that many of this complaints end up at the commission's door. That is a cultural practice. The approach taken in a station may be that the complainant is an irritant or a crank, rather than taking on the responsibility to get back to the person about the matter.

Part of the problem is probably that the blue wall of silence is still there and that is a systemic problem. In our experience, and this is linked to the point that was made about the penalty points issue, internal systems to address issues raised by gardaí who have problems with what is happening and in terms of whistleblowing are not in place; a vehicle in not in place for gardaí to do that. My understanding is that when the complaint in regard to that issue originally landed on the commission's desk, it did not come from the garda concerned but from another quarter; somebody else brought that to the witnesses' attention in October. Let us just say, somebody else or some other organisation told me that they did that, but I have been curious about whether it was the case that the witnesses thought that because the information was solely based on an internal Garda matter, they decided it was more appropriate elsewhere. There is a belief that gardaí can do what they like and that investigating themselves is a problem.

At a conference held in DCU at which the Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission and the GRA were represented, I understand the GRA said that its members would prefer an external investigation rather than what they call a lease-back case where something ends up with the witnesses and is kicked back to them. I assume what they meant is that there would be no link or no lease-back to the gardaí. From our experience we have found that people consider the idea of gardaí investigating themselves not to be a good thing. If the GRA and Garda members also believe that is not in their best interests, that is good thing which we should unleash and push from our point of view, but I wonder what the witnesses would think of that?

Why are the levels of criminal conviction so low? Is it the case that if people have a criminal offence and it is a clear-cut case of criminality, they go to a solicitor and take the matter to court. It strikes me that the level of conviction rates on foot of complaints and having regard to all the resources is too low. Have the witnesses any more information on that?

Given that the commission is set up to investigate individual complaints, I do not know what sort of data the witnesses keep. I know they cannot draw trends and that these are individual complaints but do they have access to information that would indicate, say, if there was a high percentage of complaints in Wexford that it related to particular Garda stations or is this a cultural issue throughout the organisation? Is there a culture that complainants are perceived as being interfering busybodies with whom the gardaí will not co-operate or is it that the issue of concern is that if the conduct of a garda is called into question, it would invoke employment rights issues and disciplinary rights which could have an impact on someone's career and all that big quagmire? Is it that the procedures that are in place in that sense unleash a system which makes it cumbersome to get the matter sorted out and makes it difficult whereas if the procedures in place were different, it might be a little bit easier? I know this is a little bit woolly but there is a contradiction, on the one hand, with the witnesses saying that they have all the powers they need and yet, on the other, there is this very big problem. It is something they only want to contribute to a discussion on and they have usefully done that. We believe the legislation Deputy Wallace will move later will assist in that process and in moving this forward into the public domain. I very much accept that it is new territory. I would like the witnesses to explore the culture a little more and the types of problems there are in that respect.