Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Labour)

I am pleased to have the opportunity to contribute to this debate but it is very difficult to understand what the Bill is about. It purports to make amendments to some of the most fundamental aspects of our criminal justice system but one cannot help believing it has much more to do with the upcoming general election. The Minister has been engaging in a lot of tough talking over recent weeks, particularly in recent days, and this approach seems to be much more geared towards creating an impression within the media than anything else. It is not too difficult for him to create an impression given the awe in which he is held by a number of media commentators. He is certainly working very hard to create an impression. This is fine but it is presuming that the parliamentary procedures we are supposed to respect in this House will be complied with and assumes people have very short memories. Sometimes, as public representatives, we feel people have short memories but the Minister is obviously staking a lot on this belief and on the fact that his tough talking this week will influence the electorate in the upcoming general election.

Many will approach the issue of crime during the election campaign on the basis of their experience over recent years. When those who are concerned about crime go to cast their votes, they will ask themselves whether they feel safer now than they did five years ago. When people think about this, they will give the Government a very clear answer because, quite clearly, they do not feel safer in their homes, on the streets or in their communities. There is no reason they should, considering the crime figures available to us.

The Minister has adopted the aforementioned approach and is to take major steps affecting the criminal justice system in the belief it will solve all the problems. This is how he is spinning the issue but one must ask why he is introducing this Bill a matter of weeks before the general election. He has been in office for the past five years and has had ample time to address these issues if he felt they were important. Last year, this House and the Seanad spent months debating the Criminal Justice Bill 2004, which was supposed to be the solution to all our problems and which was the result of months of consultation. It was so complex that after its publication the Minister tabled 200 amendments thereto. The Members who debated the Bill at the time did so in good faith and the Minister portrayed it as the solution to all the problems that existed, yet, nine or ten months later, we are debating yet another criminal justice Bill.

Why did the Minister get it so wrong last year and why, after five years in office, are the crime figures so appalling? It is not as if the Minister just came to office as a newcomer in 2002 without any background or experience. He took on the justice portfolio having served a term as Attorney General and he therefore must have known the issues and problems that exist. Now, only after ten years, and in the dying weeks of this Administration, is he coming up with a solution. How can anybody believe anything he is saying? He has treated the public and this House with utter contempt.

Members and the public are not fools and will not be fooled by the Minister's pretence in recent weeks that he is doing something. He has had his opportunity and failed dismally. He has had responsibility for justice over the past five years as Minister, and previously as Attorney General, but serious crime rates are now higher than ever. Last year there were 26 gun murders, which is the highest annual number ever in the State. The Minister presided over that so he cannot pretend to us now that he will do something about it in the last few weeks of this Government.

I had regard for the Minister's parliamentary performance in the past. He enjoyed respect from all sides of the House for his Dáil contributions in previous years, particularly when serving in opposition, but the manner in which he has handled this legislation is a disgrace and an affront to democracy. The Minister knows well there is a long tradition that even the simplest legislation is supposed to be published at least two weeks in advance of the debate taking place in this House. This complex and important Bill was published on 15 March and the Minister did not allow any time for proper scrutiny of the Bill. He attempted to rush it through all Stages and it was only after opposition from this side of the House that he was persuaded to allow a certain amount of time for it, although it is still not adequate.

Just as important as the Minister's failure to allow adequate time for the Opposition to consider this legislation, he allowed little or no time for the many interest groups that have a legitimate role in commenting on our justice system, such as the Bar Council, the Law Society, the Irish Council for Civil Liberties, the Irish Human Rights Commission and many others that have an interest in the area. The Minister has denied those bodies an opportunity to consider this Bill or have any input into it. He is truncating the debate on Second and Committee Stages in an attempt to rush the legislation through before the Dáil rises. That is an unacceptable way to do parliamentary business. The ICCL has circulated a paper it was obliged to produce today. The Irish Human Rights Commission is not yet in a position to do that and we have not heard from the Bar Council and the Law Society. That is not an acceptable way to do parliamentary business.

The Labour Party will not oppose this Bill but we are strongly opposed to the manner in which it has been handled and in which it is being rushed. We do not oppose the principles of the Bill but we want the time to consider its detail because that is where difficulty always lies. It is important that the concerns of the Irish Council for Civil Liberties are recorded in respect of the Bill. It has had to rush a response to the Bill because it was not consulted or given time to consider it. I am not in a position to respond to the concerns it has raised and I do not know if the Minister is in a position to do that, but I will raise the concerns anyway and see if the Minister can respond in his summing up at the end of Second Stage. The ICCL is entitled to that, as are the many others concerned about civil liberties.

Section 25 allows for the introduction of crime prevention orders. These have not been the subject of debate or consultation so far. At first, they seem similar to the serious crime prevention orders in draft serious crimes legislation in Britain. By contrast, however, serious crime prevention orders in Britain are the subject of intensive and informed debate within and outside the British Parliament. None of that debate has taken place here and it remains unclear from the Bill how the crime prevention orders proposed in it would mesh with the restriction on movement orders the Minister introduced in last year's Bill.

This Bill proposes to broaden the categories of offences for which people can be held in Garda custody for up to seven days, despite the fact that an existing seven day detention power is rarely, if ever, used. This substantial expansion of Garda detention powers is being proposed in the absence of concrete evidence that it will have any impact on gangland crime. When reviewing the existing seven day detention powers for drug trafficking offences, concerns were raised by the Council of Europe Committee on the Prevention of Torture. The ICCL expresses its concerns about the implications of this provision and the fact that there is no basis for this proposal. It has not been discussed and the Minister has not proposed any grounds on which he believes this will make any difference.

The right to silence is of concern, although personally I support these proposals. The issue, however, has been around for a long time so why, after five years in office, is it only now that the Minister is acting?

Part 3 of the Bill covers sentencing and provides for new sentencing arrangements for particular categories of offences. I draw the Minister's attention to the comments of the retired High Court judge, Mr. Feargus Flood, when he said that mandatory sentencing, per se, is an infringement of their judicial function which not only requires observance of the law but fairness and justice for the individual concerned. In the context of a discussion of the Criminal Justice Bill 2004, the Minister made the point to the select committee that sentencing guidance for judges could not be too prescriptive lest it be deemed unconstitutional. Why is the Minister now satisfied that the provisions in this Bill could not be deemed unconstitutional? The Minister is flip-flopping on this and other issues.

Points made by the Opposition and other interested bodies over the years have been utterly opposed by the Minister but now he proposes the same measures, such as electronic tagging. Deputy Howlin quoted yesterday the Minister's response to a Fine Gael proposal on electronic tagging, that it was too expensive and the technology was insufficient, and he dismissed the idea. Now, coming up to the election, it sounds like a good idea that might go down well with the punters so the Minister favours electronic tagging without any explanation for his complete shift of opinion since last year.

It is difficult to explain these changes other than as efforts by the Minister to create an impression that he is serious about crime. We have now reached the point where we have significant levels of serious crime but we have had nothing but knee-jerk reactions in the past five years to the mounting crime problem. That serious crime problem did not appear overnight. There was not a sudden upsurge in gun crime and gangland crime, for example. It was a gradual process. It has been happening over a number of years yet the failure of the Minister to address the causes and effects of that crime has led us to a situation where that crime is out of control in many ways. There is a great deal of fear in certain communities. The Acting Chairman, Deputy Carey, and I share a constituency where there is a great deal of concern about the extent of serious crime that has been allowed to develop.

The Minister will recall that the Acting Chairman, a representative of the other TD in the Dublin North-West constituency, and myself met with him privately in 2003 to express our growing concern about what was happening in our constituency. I am sure many other Members may have had similar meetings with him to raise their concerns. We did that in a private way because we were genuinely concerned about what was happening. People were being intimidated and threatened out of their own communities. Council officials were being threatened. Gardaí were afraid to tackle the problem. When a blind eye is turned to that type of activity, why should anybody be surprised when, in a matter of two or three years later, the situation is completely out of control? We went to the Minister in good faith on that occasion but he rubbished what we were saying about our constituency. He said it was not true, it was nonsense and that we were exaggerating.

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