Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Tuesday, 22 February 2022

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Justice, Defence and Equality

Antisocial Behaviour: Discussion

Photo of James LawlessJames Lawless (Kildare North, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome everybody to the meeting. I will get down to business because a number of people are under pressure with different meetings taking place this afternoon. I hope those attending remotely can hear me. I will welcome the witnesses attending remotely shortly. People might like to check their connections.

Apologies have been received from Senator Martin. If anybody wants to bring other apologies to my attention, they are welcome to do so. Some members and witnesses are physically present in the committee room while others are dialling in remotely. They are all welcome to our deliberations.

I remind all participants to turn off their mobile phones or to switch them to flight mode as even though they may not appear to be interfering during the meeting, they can difficulties for the recording.

The purpose of our meeting today is to discuss the topic of anti-social behaviour. A number of organisations made written submissions and that list, as usual, has been whittled down to a number of groups which will make presentations to us day, and we look forward to that engagement.

Witnesses who are on the call are appearing virtually. Most, if not all, of them are in locations outside of the Leinster House campus. I ask them to be mindful that while we have made best efforts to cover all eventualities, there is somewhat of a grey area remaining in terms of hybrid participation and privilege. If they say something that may be dubious in regard to a matter, they should be particularly mindful that the usual rules of privilege they would enjoy when physically present may not be applied in full. The courts have yet to test that. Let us hope they never do. Members should also be aware of that when they make their contributions.

I will run through the witnesses attending, give some background information and take an opening statement from each of the organisations. The witnesses might raise their hand as I introduce them so that we can see who is who. On the call, we are joined by the following witnesses: Ms Kayleigh Canning, senior youth officer, and Ms Bernie Meally, south east regional manager, from Foróige; Ms Una Doyle, director of operations, and Ms Olivia Keaveney, assistant principal probation officer, from the Probation Service; Mr. Richard Guiney, CEO, and Mr. Gerard Farrell, director of operations, from Dublin Town; Ms Carol Hyland, project leader, and Mr. Thomas McCarthy, drug and alcohol youth worker, from Core Youth Services; Ms Molly Joyce, acting executive director, and Ms Sarahjane McCreery, senior policy and research officer, from Irish Penal Reform Trust; and Mr. Cormac Ó Donnchú, chairperson, and Ms Sonya Kenir, partnership co-ordinator, North Dublin Inner City Local Community Safety Partnership. The members of the committee will make themselves known as the meeting unfolds. I want to check that everybody can hear me. The sound appears to be travelling.

On a housekeeping note, which I am sure we are all used to at this stage, when people are not contributing to the meeting, they should mute their device to ensure we do not have background inference, and, when they want to speak, they should unmute their device so that we can hear everything they have to say.

I mentioned privilege already and members will be aware of the rules on privilege.

Witnesses are reminded of the long-standing parliamentary practice that they should not criticise or make charges against any person or entity by name or in such a way as to make him, her or it identifiable or otherwise engage in speech that may be regarded as damaging to the good name of the person or entity, particularly if he, she or it is not present to rebut.

Members, where possible, should stick to the subject matter under discussion and not stray into ancillary matters. However, if there is a matter related to the subject, I will allow a little discretion, but we are present today for a particular purpose and it is important that we keep the discussion on topic.

We have organised the meeting in such a way as to allow maximum engagement and questions and answers. The time allowed for an opening statement by each party is somewhat short, at three minutes, but that will allow more time over the course of the meeting for engagement. There will be many opportunities for witnesses to say what they want. I will first call on a representative of each organisation to make an opening statement and inform each of those called upon when his or her three minutes is up. We will then proceed to the members. There will be a seven-minute block per member in which he or she can question and get responses from witnesses. We can go around the table a little, but when a member's seven minutes are up I will move on to the next member. This is effectively how we manage our business. It works quite well and it is fair to everybody. If needs be, if there is time and if questions remain, we can have a second round, whereby we will go through the whole process again in a slightly shorter timeframe.

There will be a couple of housekeeping matters to address at the end of the meeting but they are not for the witnesses to worry about. Members should note that we might have a very short private session at the end of the meeting to tidy up some housekeeping matters and so forth. I invite Ms Canning to make an opening statement on behalf of Foróige. She has three minutes. When the time is almost up, I will indicate that.

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