Mr. Bernard Joyce:

On bias in policing, the committee will find information in our submission on the ingrained negative view towards Travellers under policing and community engagement. Racial profiling and an inconsistent response to the community where policing is required, sometimes during times of trauma and bereavement, have impacted on some parts of Travellers' ability to have confidence in policing supports and police protection. In addition, we are aware that the findings of a relevant study undertaken in 2014 were unpublished, but it was highlighted by a journalist in 2020. The Garda ethnic liaison officer found high levels of negative attitudes towards Travellers at the time and established that all of the members of the Garda who were interviewed held those attitudes in advance of taking up positions and remained negative after taking up their positions as serving gardaí. I highlight here that there is factual information about the ingrained attitudes through which members of the Garda carried out their roles. On top of this, there is unconscious and conscious bias that has been catalogued in national studies of Travellers' own attitudes, where 70% of Travellers felt discriminated against by the Garda Síochána. When we consider this, the racial profiling, the experience of the ground and the interaction, there is a lot to be done in order to give confidence. The first part of giving confidence is that we need to see members of our own community and other minority groups represented within the Garda Síochána. That gives us confidence and it gives other people confidence. We also need to see training and it must be transparent, open, and accountable. It cannot be an ad hoctokenistic measure covered in the training of members of the Garda Síochána. There must be oversight around complaints and the procedures that take place in policing in Ireland. I am aware that Garda liaison officers are currently in situ, and on that basis it is a start.

The ethnic profiling is significant issue and we really need to get on that with regard to the policing force. Legislation proscribing racial profiling is absent, along with an independent complaints mechanism. I will restate this. We are calling for an independent complaints mechanism to deal with racial profiling and the lack of statistics.