Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)

The Taoiseach is reported in today's newspapers as quite rightly describing the murders at the weekend of Paul Quinn and John Daly as horrendous and of describing the killers as vicious thugs who must be treated accordingly. He stated further that as a community we have to stop being tolerant of these people. The community is not tolerant of crimes such as murder, shootings and what we saw over the weekend. It does appear as though the Government, which the Taoiseach leads, may be tolerant of it. I do not blame the Government every time there is a murder or a shooting but I blame it for the failure to have the criminals apprehended and put away and, to break the cycle of crime.

Since Deputy Bertie Ahern became Taoiseach, there have been 141 gun murders in the State, but only 20 convictions, a ratio of 1:7. I know he cannot stop every murder, but it is not unreasonable to ask that the Government has in place a system of policing, investigation and prosecution under which there is a better than even chance that the killers will be apprehended, tried and convicted. A conviction rate of 1:7 is clearly a failure. It needs to be recorded also, although I do not blame the Taoiseach for this, that the pattern of violent crime has changed somewhat and those involved in crime are younger and more vicious. John Daly was only 18 years when he received a nine year sentence. Many killers and violent criminals are in their teens or at best early 20s.

The people who are in touch with a community, such as teachers, youth workers and neighbours of some of these people, would be able to give a short-list of those who are likely to be the criminals of tomorrow. Only the Garda Síochána are not on top of the situation, because in my opinion, unlike the teachers, youth workers and neighbours in the communities, the Garda are not in the community. We do not have a community policing system that people can be in touch with. In the ten years since he became Taoiseach, children of ten or younger are on a conveyer belt to criminal activity, growing up on crime. The people who deal with these children in schools or neighbourhoods know where their future is heading. What advice do you give to a primary school teacher who has a ten year old child in his or her class who is disruptive in the classroom, bullying in the school yard, and perhaps from a dysfunctional family and who believes the child is heading for trouble? Who does he or she ring, what supports are there to try to lead that child away from crime and prevent the probable string of victims who will be left in that child's wake?

In short how does the Taoiseach propose to break the cycle of crime so that we do not see a repeat year after year of what we are seeing week after week?

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