Tony Gregory (Dublin Central, Independent)

I listened carefully to the statement of the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform. However, nothing he said convinced me that he is responding properly or adequately to the key statements in the Morris report. The report states:

The Tribunal is much concerned by the lack of any independent body to receive legitimate concerns about Garda behaviour. The provisions of the Garda Bill need to be reviewed by the Oireachtas, so as to satisfy the legitimate disquiet that arises from the Tribunal'sstudy . . . .

It continues:

Whatever measures are put in place must ensure that there is, indeed, a body to whom people with legitimate concerns are able to turn.

The provisions of the Garda Síochána Bill are seen as inadequate to meet those legitimate concerns.

Rushing through a patchwork of half-hearted amendments, which the Minister outlined sketchily this morning, will not address that issue. If the Minister were serious about the Morris tribunal findings, he would withdraw his Bill, give time for a measured response and radically change it. In so doing, he would do what he claims to be doing, by introducing genuine and radical reform. However, the Minister is simply not prepared to confront what the Morris report calls the combination of corruption and negligence in sections of the Garda. It is only under pressure from the findings of the Morris report that the Minister is belatedly attempting to give the impression that he wants real and radical reform of the Garda Síochána.

The House must remember that the Morris report states that the same corruption and negligence could occur again under different circumstances, in a different way, elsewhere in this State. The Morris report also states that while Donegal may not have been a representative sample of senior ranks of the Garda Síochána, it is also equally possible that it was. This report imposes an obligation on the Minister to ensure that the most effective necessary steps are taken to reform the Garda, so that the culture of cover up does not repeat itself with other miscarriages of justice. Equally, it imposes an obligation on the Minister that any other apparent miscarriages of justices, whether involving corruption or negligence or both, which are brought to his attention are properly and independently investigated.

For example, I support the call by the family of Eddie Fullerton for the publication of the second Garda investigation into his murder and for a full inquiry into that case and into the case of James Sheehan, referred to by Deputy Ferris. I attempted to raise that case in this House in March 1992 only to receive a direction that the then Minister for Justice had no official responsibility to the Dáil on the matter and that it was a matter for the Garda complaints board. We know what happened there. The important point is that ignoring cases like James Sheehan was part of the culture which produced the miscarriage of justice and which allowed it to happen to the McBreartys. This is my considered view.

I was interested to hear the Minister's statement refer to and reject any impression of reluctance to have an inquiry into the McBrearty affair on the part of the Government, because I wish to refer to another miscarriage of justice where he has displayed a marked reluctance to have any inquiry and quite definitely has not been seen to be, "most anxious at every hand's turn to have the truth of the [case] established". As the Minister has probably guessed, I refer to the case of Dean Lyons. It is a case which has been raised with the Minister since he took office and about which, so far, he has done nothing. I raise it again now because of its relevance to this debate. Dean Lyons was charged with a murder he did not commit, fitted with a statement of admission or confession which he simply could not have made and left in prison for many months, even after a second person had admitted the crime to gardaí.

All the evidence overwhelmingly points in the direction of a deliberate miscarriage of justice, with possibly corrupt practices used to set Dean Lyons up with a contrived confession. Even as Attorney General, the Minister was fully aware of the details of this case. It has been raised with him since he took office over the past three years and still nothing has been done. Reluctantly, he will appoint a senior counsel at some stage to examine the Garda papers pertaining to the case — if they still exist by then. This will not be done to see if a full inquiry is justified, but to see "what lessons might be learned".

The examination of Garda papers by a senior counsel led to the establishment of the Morris tribunal. It may well lead to a full inquiry into the Dean Lyons case, but why has it taken three years for the Minister to take this step? Why did he do nothing until he was pressurised by public concern, raised inside and outside the House, about this case? As I have stated, the Minister was well aware of the critical issues in the Dean Lyons case, even as Attorney General. However, Dean Lyons was a destitute heroin addict, with no one to campaign for him. Perhaps that is the reason why the Minister has not shown himself to be so anxious to establish the truth in this case.

The record of this Minister on other miscarriages of justice does not match the statements he made this morning about the McBrearty case. He has not shown himself to be one who wishes to get at the truth at every hand's turn. He has not even shown himself to be willing to inquire into what must be the most blatant miscarriage of justice in the history of the State.

See this speech in context