Charles Flanagan (Laois-Offaly, Fine Gael)

I acknowledge the Minister expresses concern about this matter. However, in doing so, I say to him that the time has come to express more than concern. The situation is deteriorating quite rapidly. This year alone, there were over 100 shootings in the city of Dublin, which have been accompanied by 40 bomb attacks. As recently as last weekend, a grenade attack on a private house took place.

Can the Minister explain how organisations such as the INLA have been able to thrive in Dublin to the extent they have in recent times, along with other perhaps more orthodox criminal gangs, and why appropriate action has not been taken to bring these people to justice and stop this litany of bombing, grenades and shootings of record proportions?

See this speech in context