Alan Shatter (Dublin South, Fine Gael)

Part of the problem in this regard has been that the State, in the guise of the current Minister for Justice and Law Reform and his predecessors over recent years, has utterly failed to provide the type of service necessary to ensure that those who have been convicted of sexual offences and wish to undergo treatment are provided with treatment. Services have been made available for too few convicted sexual offenders. That is a real problem.

We need to ensure that when a sexual offender is sentenced to a term of imprisonment, action is taken by the State, as far as possible - because there are no guarantees in this area - to substantially reduce the possibility of his or her reoffending. In no circumstances should a sexual offender who refuses treatment be granted early release. That is a form of contempt for the judicial process in circumstances in which judges, as an independent arm of the State, have passed a sentence. It is a failure to ensure that the full weight of the law and the impact of a sentence imposed for a horrendous act is experienced by the offender. Frankly, it shows contempt for the circumstances of the victim and the trauma experienced by him or her due to both the crime itself and the necessity of going through a trial.

The amendments tabled here seek, in the context of dealing with the Parole Board, to address this issue. There is a need for substantial reform in this area. This is an issue I raised in a draft Bill as long ago as 2002 and again in an updated version of that Bill dealing with victims' rights, which was voted down in June 2007, at which time the Minister told the House that the Government would address all of these issues. There has been no legislation on the manner in which the Parole Board deals with applications for early release of prisoners. There is no transparency to the system - which is necessary in the public interest, so the general public can understand how the system works - and no proper role for victims of crime. We should not maintain a system under which those who have been convicted of predatory offences, who have a real risk of reoffending, and where the public may be at serious risk upon their release, may be considered for early release if they have not accepted treatment.

In the context of convicted sexual offenders, there is a strong case to be made that upon their release they should be electronically tagged for a period of time and not simply be names on a register to which the Garda has access but the general public do not. The general public are then left in a position of not knowing who these offenders are because of the issue of anonymity, which we have discussed previously; and where the offenders' names are known, there is no reasonable way of monitoring the way in which they are conducting themselves in the early period following their release. At the very minimum there should be electronic tagging for a period after release, particularly for those offenders who have not undergone a treatment programme.

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