David Stanton (Cork East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I am glad to have the opportunity to speak to this Bill. I commend Deputy Halligan on bringing it forward. It is important we debate these issues in the Chamber. I recognise the amount of work that has gone into preparing it and I listened to his speech and agree with a great deal of what he said. Unfortunately, there are technical issues with the Bill, as were mentioned by the Minister of State, which make it impossible for the Government to accept it. However, the general thrust of and thinking in the Bill are correct. The Deputy is aware that the Minister has published the Criminal Justice (Community Sanctions) Bill and referred it to the Committee on Justice, Defence and Equality, which I chair. We have called for submissions on this Bill. The Deputy has until 4 April to make a submission and then we hope to have some hearings on it and to report back to Government shortly after that. We have done that with quite a number of items of legislation. I would welcome if the Deputy would consider making a submission to the committee on these issues. One of the sections of that Bill proposes a limited and specific restorative justice approach in regard to District Court proceedings. The Minister is already taking on board the genesis and thrust of what the Deputy is talking about. The heads of that Bill have been published and we are engaged in the process of pre-legislative scrutiny. This legislation is useful because, with the Deputy's permission, we will take it into account in the work of the Committee on Justice, Defence and Equality.

The committee has published some work on penal reform which also feeds into the thinking the Deputy has brought forward this evening. We have discovered in some jurisdictions the number of people in prison has been brought down and the level of crime has fallen. There are things that can be done to reduce costs in this area, to reduce the number of people in prison and to reduce the level of crime at the same time. Finland is a case in point. Members of the committee visited Finland and we examined what they have done there. Its prison population has dropped, the level of crime has dropped and the associated costs have dropped. We held hearings on this area and it is amazing to discover what is happening in Ireland. Our probation service is doing tremendous work. I draw the House's attention to the Young Persons Probation family conference. That is a particularly good piece of work. It sets out that:

A family conference is a meeting involving the young person and members of his/her family, the victim and relevant others. It is ordered by the court and run by Young Persons Probation. At the meeting the young person's offence will be discussed with regard to its effect on the victim, the community and on the young person's family.

The conference will explore ways that the young person takes responsibility for his/her behaviour, for the consequences and where possible to put things right by making good the damage.

Much of what the Deputy is talking about is already occurring. IASIO, for instance, is doing amazing work in this area. Another group is the Care After Prison organisation in Aungier Street. It links up with prisoners before they leave prison, prepares them for release and meets them when they leave prison. The last time I visited that organisation they told me they had a 100% success rate of prisoners not re-offending by supporting them on release and guiding them.

The Joint Committee on Justice, Defence and Equality recently discussed the concept of a community court. Deputy Mattie McGrath mentioned what is happening in Nenagh. The committee is strongly considering the concept of a community court and we had hearings on it a number of weeks ago. Under this concept a person who commits a low level offence is brought almost immediately before a court if they plead guilty to the offence and they are invariably given a community sanction or community service of some sort. They start that immediately and are monitored for six months and if they stay out of trouble for six months, their record is sealed. That has happened in Manhattan in New York. The first community court was the court in Midtown in Manhattan and it has managed to clean up a great deal of crime in Manhattan, Time Square, Central Park and so forth. There is a great deal of new thinking in this area.

The Deputy's Bill is on the right track. There are technical difficulties with it but we would welcome if the Deputy made a submission to the Committee on Justice, Defence and Equality on the Bill that is before us, the Criminal Justice (Community Sanctions) Bill which contains a great deal of what the Deputy has in this Bill. We do not need to duplicate the work. The general scheme of that Bill has been published and we are working on it but it is important to debate these issues here tonight.

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