Commissioner Simon O'Brien:

I will respond first to the Deputy's first points. We are very happy to come to this committee or other Oireachtas committees. We believe that police accountability and oversight is a very important issue for the wider Irish public and others in which to engage. The Deputy need not worry about the time we have available today or however busy it has been; we are quite happy to come back to the committee.

In terms of the culture that is in place, and picking up on some of the Deputy's later points, there are two issues involved. The Garda Síochána Act is both facilitative and obstructive. The Deputy made the point that many people go to a Garda station to make a complaint. In terms of the culture that is in place, and I was around many Garda stations in my last job when I was with the inspectorate, many gardaí working at the hatch would say that if a person comes to the station to make a complaint, he or she would hand the person a GSOC 1, which is a form on which one records a complaint. The garda would do so because the Act provides that as soon as someone complains, a garda must record that matter. Unfortunately, once a complaint is recorded, it brings us into a whole bureaucratic discipline-run process, whereby as soon as a member is mentioned in a complaint that member must be told about the complaint and then we go through a whole bureaucratic process. Coming back to our legislative amendments, it would be helpful if we could divide that first interaction whereby the first thing that would happen is that rather than a garda handing out a complaint form out, he or she would have a conversation with the person. The garda would ask the person exactly what he or she wants to talk to us about. We find that the vast majority of these issues are about matters such as the person concerned needs his or her car back, or the person's property is in the police station and it has been there too long, or someone was rude to the person the other day and he or she wants us to have a chat with that person. These are the types of issues we find land on our desk time after time because the form has been completed. As Commissioner Foley said, disciplinary relations have been there a very long time. They are complex and, quite rightly, a garda, once a complaint is made against him or her, has all the rights he or she would want for protection under those disciplinary relations and under the Act. We are up against some long-standing issues in terms of discipline and now in terms of the Act. The Garda Síochána Act is great in many ways but it is rather pragmatic in the way it was put together and it brings us into that legalise position with which we are stuck in terms of this process.

If and when legislative amendments come forward from Members of these Houses, and there is a proper and sensible debate about them, I believe that could provide some solutions both for gardaí and the members' constituents who complain about them.

On the whistleblowing issues, we examined that, as Commissioner Foley said earlier in her submission, and made a decision based upon what was before us at that time. We were faced at that time with a serving Garda member making a complaint, and we were not amenable in that regard. I would say to the members, and we have made it quite open-ended, that there are many things happening in that particular inquiry at the moment. We just reserve our position, and I believe that is the place to be.

In terms of criminal convictions in regard to complaints, we never see that as either a positive or negative performance indicator for us as an oversight body. I would much rather ask whether we are getting satisfaction in terms of confidence from the Irish people in what we are and, thus far, we have found that many people do have some confidence in us as an independent body. We hope that these sort of engagements, and the fact that we are putting this discussion in the public domain to allow other people to comment on it, would increase the levels of confidence people have in us as an organisation and, by definition, in the Garda Síochána in that they are seen to be accountable.

We are first dealing with what are often quite minor issues of service failure. Members will note that when we have got serious matters of complaint we have taken those forward, albeit we have reported to the members about delays. We have had gardaí going to prison, the issue of gardaí being sanctioned by their own Commissioner, and gardaí who have put money in a poor box because they have been found wanting in a court of this land. However, we do not take any succour from that. What we, as a commission, look for is whether we are providing a valuable service using our resources to the best of their ability, and gaining the confidence of people who want to come forward and make a complaint to us.

In many ways we will be fighting a battle in relation to a culture. As I said to the Deputy earlier, in a previous life I was in a police service in another country in which there was no oversight when I first joined in 1978. I was prouder of the police force I left 32 years later where we had bodies such as police authorities, an independent police oversight body and where we were called to account regarding the way our informants were used. There was legislation over-arching that entire area. Frankly, as far as I was concerned, the police force I joined was a closed, white, male dominated force of men and women that was outside the public. The force I left in London was much more inclusive. We had greater confidence but in that time we had gone through a great deal of bad blood in terms of being found wanting on a number of occasions. That is very painful for a police service but it is a very valuable process through which every free democracy must go through.

If we can in some way facilitate open debate on this and other issues and if we can come before this committee or other committees and have a useful discussion with colleagues from the press, and others, when we leave this commission in three and a half or five years time we will be in a much better position. Bringing this to the committee's light today has been our sole issue. We do not want headlines; we want headway.