Brian Stanley (Laois-Offaly, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I want to touch on a few points around the Dublin riots. GSOC had the powers to open a public interest investigation. With regard to the riots, it is clear from video footage, news bulletins and individual members of the Garda that a number of gardaí were left in very dangerous situations.

One was left on his own in a van that was surrounded by people who threatened to set it on fire. Another garda was standing near O'Connell Bridge surrounded by a crowd attacking him. He did not seem to have a baton or anything else. Two gardaí cycled into the middle of it and had to escape into a public house or hotel for safety. I saw on video footage that one or two of their bicycles were thrown into the River Liffey. I understand it can be difficult to manage large public order events, but there was another clip showing six members of the public order unit standing across a wide street, facing a crowd of what looked like several hundred. If even a small number of them had tried to break through, they would not have been able to stop them because there were gaps of yards between the gardaí and they had no backup whatsoever.

Everything cannot be foreseen, but that has been building up for a long time. There were a lot of complaints by public representatives, business associations and local residents in the weeks and months before. On the evening in question, from the early afternoon it was clear online. I was not watching it but it came out afterwards that it was clear that online there were people whipping people up for a major confrontation with An Garda Síochána and for carrying out violence in the centre of Dublin city. I would have expected Garda management to have someone monitoring social media. If it did, what happened? Why were those warning bells not taken heed of?

There was also an issue with deployment. Some gardaí told me that some of their colleagues who were not on duty just went there. They were not called up by anyone. They got a message from a friend in the force and just drove into the city, some from other counties, to try to help to ensure public safety and protect member of An Garda Síochána. On the face of it, it looks as though management of An Garda Síochána was absent. It was chaotic. I understand that the situation was chaotic and volatile. I am trying to preface my point with that, but individual members of An Garda Síochána on the ground were left with an awful situation. I have heard many people complaining about it. Individual members of An Garda Síochána have certainly told me there was an absence of planning for an event that was almost certain to happen, there was an absence of any kind of deployment, an absence of co-ordination. From GSOC's point of view, as the body that oversees An Garda Síochána, takes complaints and has the power to open a public interest investigation, has it considered doing so?