Patrick Costello (Dublin South Central, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 4:

In page 33, between lines 5 and 6, to insert the following: "(d) shall cause a public consultation and public information campaign to be carried out,".

We talk a lot about policing by consent and that fundamental principle. I brought similar amendments to previous Garda Bills we have dealt with here. It is incredibly important to include public consultation from the beginning and make it a requirement. This serves several purposes. It first ensures people know what the rules are and that they know the law. As we all know, ignorance of the law is no excuse, but this is a chance for people to understand how the Garda operates, how our police service operates, and for them to feed into that through consultation. Again, we spend a lot of time talking about policing by consent, which is very important. This public consultation is an important part of policing by consent.