Tommy Broughan (Dublin North East, Labour)

I welcome the opportunity to contribute to this important debate. Like my colleague, the Labour Party's justice spokesperson, Deputy Howlin, I welcome the general principles underlying the legislation. Any measures aimed at successfully securing penalties against gang-related crime, including racketeering, in addition to tightening the bail rules as outlined in Part 2, are certainly welcome. It is an outrage that dastardly criminal deeds have been carried out by individuals while on bail, and this has rightly been condemned by the public.

The late timing and shambolic manner of this Bill's introduction is typical of the cavalier approach adopted by the Minister and the Government towards crime prevention and policing. This approach is also reflected in Part 8 of the Bill in which I have a particular interest. It amends the controversial Sea Fisheries Act 2006, which was passed at this time last year with very little consultation. It introduced ferocious penalties for workers in the fishing industry. It was thought in the marine and natural resources sector at the time that a package of measures had been introduced to enable a new sea fisheries protection authority to do its job, yet the new authority began its work only in the last month or so. We have had a fundamental and wide-ranging debate on penalties for sea fisheries offences, but it is amazing that a section of this Bill has had to be devoted to establishing various crimes associated with the packaging and marketing of fish products onshore. That business had to be included in the Criminal Justice Bill which, rightly, brings forward serious new measures on racketeering, drug-related crime and so on.

I heard the Tánaiste and Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, Deputy McDowell, on the radio today discussing the fact that a large part of his five years as Minister was spent in consideration of the Criminal Justice Bill 2004. I know from the Department of Communications, Marine and Natural Resources that civil servants are often under enormous pressure to construct legislation and this is especially the case in an area as crucial as the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform. However, the political leadership given by the Minister was found wanting and the fact that we are bringing forward an addendum to the major Bill four weeks before the end of this Government strikes me as the wrong way to do business for the people. As Deputy Catherine Murphy rightly said, this is something on which the people will pass judgment in the coming weeks.

Most Members, especially my party colleagues, support legislative measures to tackle criminal behaviour that makes a misery of the lives of decent citizens around the country, but we also need law that is well considered, consistent and constitutional so that we will not see repetition of some of the legal blunders that have been the hallmark of this Minister. In many parliaments the Minister, Deputy McDowell, would have been expected to resign last summer because his handling of the key issue was grossly incompetent. If I had been dealing with this portfolio his resignation would have been a basic requirement.

There are positive aspects to the Minister's record over the past five years and I commend him particularly on introducing the Garda Bill, as it was an important achievement. He did well to set up the Ombudsman's commission, which is due to go into operation shortly, and to establish the Garda Inspectorate. These bodies will be important in the coming years in ensuring the policing of the nation is carried out in a transparent and effective manner. I also welcome the fact that the Minister established the local Garda committees that the Labour Party proposed. The second meeting of the committee in my area is due next month. The Minister also established the Garda Reserve to which he referred in his speech. It is striking, though, that by the end of this Government term a mere 143 Garda Reserve members will have qualified out of the 1,500 we anticipated and which the Minister mentions in his speech as an achievement. I commend the Minister on bringing the Garda Bill through the Oireachtas but overall the headline levels of crime in this country show that the Minister's record is appalling.

The Economic and Social Research Institute, ESRI, recently published a book, The Best of Times: The Social Impact of the Celtic Tiger. It uses data up to 2002 and shows that the level of homicide in Dublin rose by an astonishing 44.5% from the early 1990s to 2002. The book compares various EU capital cities and the next worst increase was in Vienna at 28% followed by London at 8%. The trends in Dublin now would be far worse because last year there were 26 appalling gangland killings. Within a five-month period six such killings occurred in the west of my constituency and presented communities with horrific circumstances in which to live. This is why I support some of the key measures before us.

I support the initiative on tagging but, as Deputy Howlin indicated, there are still questions on the technology. People are afraid that, as with other technological developments involving the Government, there may be future problems. However, anything that enables us to ensure that prisons are places where, as Deputy Catherine Murphy suggested, primarily the most hardened criminals are detained is to be welcomed. I note the concerns of many interest groups in this regard, including the submission I received from the Irish Council for Civil Liberties, which also flagged the seven-day Garda detention custody measures. The council also highlighted the inferences to be drawn in certain circumstances relating to the final report of the balance in the criminal law review group which, I think, the Minister appointed. There is broad public support for a more rigorous approach to gangland crime and the Department of Justice, Equality and Law Reform has attempted to address these issues as efficaciously as possibly.

I also support section 6 of the Bill which mandates that applicants for bail must, if required, provide a statement of their net assets and income plus details of criminal convictions and previous bail conditions. This is necessary if potentially violent offenders and drug dealers are to be dealt with and removed from society.

The scourge of drugs and the increased supply of drugs is continuing to take a horrendous toll on our communities. Over the past year and a half I have attended between 12 and 15 funerals, mostly of young men who died between their late teens and mid twenties. Occasionally a person in his or her thirties, who suffered from the drug scourge in previous decades, dies in these circumstances.

The Minister, Deputy McDowell, never looks at the broader picture and this is a major failing of his relating to justice. The British Labour Party sums up the correct approach in the phrase, "Tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime". The Progressive Democrats have never been tough on the causes of crime. In my constituency a major anti-drugs project, the Kilbarrack Coast Community Programme, has needed a basic facility with permanent, professional staff for the past ten years and this Government has done nothing substantial for that organisation. Another district of my constituency was plagued by anti-social behaviour and drug-related crime in the past and only in the next few weeks, in the final days of this Government, will a general community youth centre be opened, probably by the Taoiseach and the local Fianna Fáil Deputies. Owing to his fundamental anti-social and economically inclined philosophy the Minister has failed to address the causes of crime. In his speech he trumpeted the additional resources allocated to the Garda, but individual constituencies such as mine have perhaps 200 gardaí trying cope with a population of up to 100,000 people in an area with significant crime figures.

I am struck by the contributions Mr. Vincent Browne makes in his programmes and columns every time the Garda Síochána annual report on crime levels is released. He suggests Ireland is not a high crime country. Mr. Browne is a journalist of the highest calibre and I admire him but I think his opinions on crime levels are wrong. There are points he should have noted about Ireland in his many decades in journalism. Tonight, in large parts of our towns and cities, people will be forced to live in terror for hours on end due to unbearable anti-social behaviour and serious drug-related crime, which completely destroy lives. It is fine for someone living in certain leafy suburbs of south Dublin to argue that Irish crime figures compare well with those of Austria but many communities live under terrible pressure because they are infested with and destroyed by crime and Garda efforts to help are hindered by a lack of manpower. The Minister has failed to address the dimensions of the problem.

Aspects of the Bill are welcome as being tough on crime and I commend civil servants for introducing it, even if it is late. Overall, the Minister and his predecessor in the Department, Deputy O'Donoghue, the zero tolerance Minister, have failed us by giving us a decade in which crime has been allowed to get out of control in many areas. The slogan for the coming election should be "Fianna Fáil-PD Coalition, No Way".

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