Michael McDowell (Dublin South East, Progressive Democrats)

The House has a duty to ensure the Garda functions today, tomorrow, next week and next month to the highest standards and all of us share that duty. Now is the time to put in place a genuinely independent complaints system, a new framework for the governance of the Garda, an inspectorate to ensure there are high standards in the Garda, benchmarked to the best international practice and a whistleblower's charter. Now is the time to give the Garda the internal systems which will allow it to be responsive to the House, local authorities and to the community and to make statutory provision for the establishment of a reserve because Garda numbers matter and they must be increased in a society whose population is increasing and where criminality and its complexity is ever more demanding in terms of the force's resources and time.

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