Jim O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay South, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The Minister of State is not the first Independent Member to have an interest in justice legislation but, unlike the others, he has a good chance of getting agreement in certain areas. The substantive part of the legislation is about amending the Punishment of Incest Act 1908. After the Criminal Law (Sexual Offences) Act was enacted last year we had the anomalous position whereby men convicted of incest were subject to a term of imprisonment of life but this did not apply in respect of women. Sections 2 and 3 of this Bill propose to harmonise that situation. The inappropriate sentence of life imprisonment has been reduced to ten years and it applies to both men and women so there is equality in that regard.

We are discussing the points made by Deputies Wallace and Clare Daly against sections 4 and 5 of the Bill, which are the Minister's part of the legislation. Sentencing is an extremely complicated area and politicians sometimes try to simplify it by introducing legislation. A recent serious offence, the kind which the Minister wants to see dealt with vigorously, involved a woman, Leona O'Callaghan, who gave up her anonymity. She was a complainant in a serious crime in which she was the victim of rape and the person accused was convicted of her rape. That person was already serving a 15-year sentence for raping another girl and, when his sentencing came up, the judge was well aware of this. The judge gave him a sentence of 17 years' imprisonment, which is very lengthy, but the Minister is proposing that the judge impose a sentence of at least ten years. My concern is that, when judges have to impose ten years, they start at that level but a person convicted of rape, such as in the case of Ms O'Callaghan, deserve a very lengthy sentence. Along with other people, I believe Ms O'Callaghan was satisfied with the sentence handed out to her rapist but she was concerned over another area of sentencing law to which we do not give consideration here, namely, that his sentences will not run consecutively but concurrently.

I agree with much of what Deputies Clare Daly and Wallace said to the effect that mandatory sentencing is very arbitrary. It takes away the discretion of a court. We all assume judges impose light sentences but they do not. They have imposed many serious sentences for rape and other serious sexual offences in recent times and we have to stop the story getting out that the courts do not treat sexual offences seriously. People get very lengthy sentences for rape and serious sexual offences.

We supported this legislation on Second Stage, though I did not have an opportunity to speak, and I will support it here, though I have some concerns. It has been through the Office of the Attorney General, and that fact gives me some concern. I have two issues. We have to be very careful not to identify sex offenders as completely separate from other criminal offenders. The Oireachtas asserts its disapproval of criminal activity through the sentences we say should apply. Murder gets a mandatory life sentence but no other crime does. If a person is convicted of murder and commits another serious offence afterwards, we would not contemplate forcing them to serve a life sentence. The Oireachtas has decided that there should be a set period of imprisonment for some offences, as set out in the Schedule, with five years for some offences and ten for others, and that is how we set out our disapproval of certain actions. We need to be careful about this. The Minister could also be asked why these provisions do not also apply to all other serious offences.

We also need proper sentencing guidelines. The guidelines, in the form of decisions of the criminal section of the Court of Appeal, are there to be looked at and convicts can have an understanding of what type of sentence they will get from the courts by looking at the thresholds set by the Court of Appeal. However, we would benefit from the courts setting out sentencing guidelines in respect of these and other offences so that there is greater clarity. No matter what guidelines we have, or what amount of harmonisation we aim for, there are always going to be different circumstances. The victim will be different, as will the accused, and their circumstances will vary. By bringing in mandatory sentencing we are taking away from the ability of the court to exercise its discretion.

I will not support the calls to repeal these sections but the points merit further consideration. The way to do it is by enacting the Judicial Council Bill and getting the judicial guidelines up and running.