Mr. Diarmuid Cronin:

Muintir na Tíre community alert groups are set up in all the towns in west Cork: Clonakilty, Bandon, Bantry and Dunmanway.

There are also neighbourhood watch groups within the towns. The community alert can often be an umbrella organisation. The community alert has the advantage in that the development officers are in place. The neighbourhood watch group has the liaison Garda who attends the community alert meetings but the extra resource of the Muintir na Tíre development officer is a huge advantage.

The issues in towns are in many ways similar. Anti-social behaviour is one of the more important issues that needs to be dealt with in towns and housing estates where people who have purchased homes are unfortunate enough to be neighbours of individuals who are making their life a misery. It is an issue that has become more prevalent at the meetings I attend. In some areas, one would imagine there is an organised systemic campaign to drive people out of their homes. It is the issue of the future and it is growing. There is a victim-bully relationship in certain cases where the individual is afraid of the bullies and afraid to make a statement to the Garda and afraid to use legal means. It is necessary to create some system where a community group can act as an individual and make a statement of complaint and take a case on behalf of their community to change the way certain estates are being ruined by individuals who could not care less about their neighbours.