Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

These amendments are really quite extraordinary. Clearly, the Minister is giving himself draconian powers in advance of the G8 summit. The British Government, the authorities in the North and now, sadly, this Government are party to whipping up a climate of hysteria and fear before the G8 summit, and these amendments are part of creating that climate of fear. It is a cynical strategy of tension in advance of that summit and is designed to discourage legitimate protests and demonstrations against the policies of the G8. That is the reason these amendments are being made at such short notice. That is the context for this Bill and it is why it is entirely legitimate for us to point out that what the Minister should be doing, instead of cynically whipping up a climate of fear to give himself power to discourage and scare people from engaging in legitimate protests against the G8, is facilitating a discussion about the policies of the G8 and how they represent a far more serious threat to human life, the environment and the welfare of citizens throughout the world than any so-called terrorist threat the Minister tries to conjure up to justify this legislation.

I will support that assertion. Incredibly, this set of amendments is being tabled at the same time as 3,500 police are being drafted into the North from Britain to create a ring of steel around the G8. Drone airplanes which have been used to wreak death and destruction on thousands of innocent people in Afghanistan are being deployed in the North of Ireland around the G8 summit. The Police Service of Northern Ireland, PSNI, has announced that a former army base is to be opened to detain protesters and that there will be special sittings of the courts in the North on Sundays. That is absolutely unheard of. To put it in context, the Democratic Unionist Party, DUP, which is supporting this, does not even allow children's playgrounds to open on Sundays. Now, it wants courts to open on Sundays in advance of the G8 summit.

Against that background, the Minister has brought forward these amendments at the last minute and without proper debate to deal with potential terrorist threats and is using that to justify him having the power to interfere with mobile telephone communications in advance of the summit. He knows that demonstrations will be organised by anti-poverty, environmental and anti-globalisation groups, trade unions and many other groups in civil society against the militarist policies of the G8 and against the policies the G8 use to protect and promote the interests of multinationals and financial speculators at the expense of hundreds of millions of ordinary citizens around the world. Rather than discussing a bogus terrorist threat, the Minister should be discussing the fact that there are 900 million people starving in the world as a result of the policies of the G8.

Let us put this in context. At the last G8 summit, a commitment was made to give €20 billion to deal with world poverty. It is a pathetic figure when one compares it, for example, with the €400 billion that are given in subsidies to the fossil fuel industry which is destroying our climate. However, the G8 did not even deliver on the €20 billion commitment. It is a tiny fraction of what the G8 countries spend on weapons and war. The United States, for example, accounts for 41% of all military spending. They are responsible for taking the lives of hundreds of thousands of people in Iraq and tens of thousands in Afghanistan. They have a massive nuclear arsenal, paid for with trillions of dollars. The Minister talks about the terrorist threat. They are the terrorist threat, and the Minister is putting a ring of steel around them instead of having a serious discussion about who represents the real threat. This is clearly designed to discourage protests, demonstrations and serious debate about the policies of the G8.

It is absolutely right in this context to raise the issue of how these superpowers have been facilitating the financial and corporate interests that caused the economic crisis that now besets the globe. We have found more evidence yet again of how these interests are not even paying taxes in this country or any other country to contribute to the societies from which they generate their billions and sometimes trillions in profits, which should be going back into society but are being hoarded by a global, super-wealthy elite. Why is the Minister not discussing the damage that is doing to our economy and society, the damage their militarism is doing to millions of people around the world and how their policies contribute to global poverty and environmental destruction? It is cynical on his part and on the part of the authorities in the North.

It is somewhat disappointing that parties in the Northern Assembly, including those which are represented in the Dáil, are not speaking up very loudly against this and demanding that this climate of fear the Minister is trying to whip up be abandoned. The Minister should allow protests and not try to discourage, intimidate or interfere with them.

For example, will the Minister use these powers to try to prevent protesters from communicating with one another in advance of the G8 summit in County Fermanagh? We have absolutely no safeguards to suggest he will not abuse these powers in that way.

In 2002 I was in Genoa at the G8 summit when a young Italian was murdered by the Italian Carabinieri which ran amok against peaceful protesters protesting against the policies of the attendees at the summit. I hope the Minister will assure us that the authorities of the State and in the North will not abuse their powers and do the same to peaceful protestors in County Fermanagh.

See this speech in context