Clare Daly (Dublin Fingal, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I will come to it in a minute. If we cannot ask the Garda representatives about this matter, could we write to them to ask questions? We spoke about co-location and the fact that the Minister for Children and Youth Affairs, Deputy Katherine Zappone, is moving but a number of the suggestions for PULSE could have been brought in in January, such as laminated cards, risk principles, guidelines and the suggestion for the changeover in car seats. The fact that Dr. Shannon does not know the answer is not an indictment of him but of the lack of follow-up within the Garda. We need to know about the annual review and we should put on the record that the study showed it to be an exceptional power, only exercised once in the lifetime of an average garda. It is not too onerous to have the level of data reporting which he outlined.

Deputy Wallace made a point about outsourcing and third party providers. Dr. Shannon raised serious legal questions about the legality of the Garda transferring somebody to Five Rivers or a third party provider. There may not be a lawful basis for this so has there been any feedback from Government about correcting the anomaly? If there has not been an answer, it would be very poor.

My last question is about the Policing Authority. We have been to the fore in saying the Policing Authority has been disappointing and is not sufficiently equipped to challenge gardaí. Has Dr. Shannon given his report to the Policing Authority? What feedback did he get? The authority should be flagging the systemic failures in child protection which he highlighted but I have heard nothing from it in that regard.