Pádraig Mac Lochlainn (Donegal North East, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I commend Deputy Ross on his Bill. Given the various scandals that have emerged in the administration of justice, we need to challenge the political control of policing and particularly the appointment of senior police officers by a Minister and, in turn, backed by the Government. We have seen various examples of this. The former Garda Commissioner, Martin Callinan, announced the closure of 140 Garda stations and a 10% cut in Garda numbers. In some Garda districts the cutbacks ran to a level of almost 30%, while hundreds of Garda vehicles were also cut. All of this was described as efficiency, modernisation and smart policing by the former Commissioner, to the fury of his own men and women serving on the ground right up to sergeant and inspector level. The lower and middle Garda ranks were furious about the position taken by the former Garda Commissioner.

The former Minister for Justice and Equality repeatedly protected the former Garda Commissioner and senior gardaí from proper accountability and analysis of their performance. We had that unhealthy situation for far too long, so we clearly need to see the independent appointment of senior gardaí.

Sinn Féin has published its own proposals on these matters. We want to see the promised new Garda authority - and I believe it will happen - appointing the Garda Commissioner along with the deputy and assistant commissioners.

Last week, members of the Oireachtas Committee on Justice, Defence and Equality had an opportunity to visit our opposite numbers in the North. We also met the Police Ombudsman up there and the PSNI board. The following day we went to Scotland to meet the new police authority that oversees Police Scotland. Up to recent years, the Scottish police had eight constabularies, while there is now one with a Chief Constable accountable to the Scottish Police Authority. That authority appoints senior police, while the PSNI appoints senior police in Northern Ireland.

The PSNI board has 19 members, ten of which are serving politicians appointed by the d'Hondt system which is based on the strength of political parties or independents. That board recently unanimously appointed a Chief Constable, which is quite remarkable in a divided society. They have every confidence in the new Chief Constable. There is rigorous accountability and most of their business meetings are held in public session. That is the way to go and it is what we want to see. We want to support Deputy Ross's Bill as an interim measure but we need safeguards and assurances prior to the establishment of the new Garda authority.

Because of the scale of the crisis and the challenges we face, there is now a political consensus that we need an independent Garda authority. We trust that the Minister, Deputy Fitzgerald, will ensure that happens. The Committee on Justice, Defence and Equality will soon be making unanimous recommendations on an all-party basis. I have no doubt we will recommend the type of model we would like to see. Clearly, we want to see an independent Garda authority but it remains to be decided how many people will sit on it, if it will have political representatives, and what will be the scope of its responsibilities.

One of the issues that arose in Scotland concerned an inevitable tension in this new dispensation whereby the new authority was in conflict with senior police on issues including budgets and human resources. Their advice to us was to ensure the legislation is very clear on what the new Garda authority will do and what it has control over, so there is no unnecessary conflict at the start.

The model we propose is for a Garda authority with 20 members from a variety of backgrounds, including legal, human rights, academic, civil society and law enforcement expertise. While we believe there should be political representation, it should be in a minority on that board and based on the d'Hondt allocation system. Our colleagues in the North have testified how well that has worked. Of course, they have disagreements but in the main they work together to ensure they can deliver a new policing model.

It is an exciting time despite the crisis we have had. To borrow from the Chinese philosophy, the flip side of crisis is opportunity. We now have a real opportunity to complete the unfinished business that followed the Morris tribunal. We had the Garda Síochána Act 2005 which brought in the new Garda Ombudsman and the Garda Inspectorate. However, we now need to see a profound change in the relationship between the Minister for Justice and Equality and the police. An independent Garda authority is required. We also need to see a change in culture throughout the organisation.

The mistake we made was to bring in the oversight model but without a shadow of a doubt the Garda Ombudsman did not have the requisite powers to fulfil its responsibilities. However, we did not seek a change in the existing culture of An Garda Síochána from the person at the front desk right up to the Garda Commissioner. When she first took up her new portfolio, I heard the Minister say in a radio interview that it is a closed culture. I entirely agree with her. Police services tend to be closed cultures. They have a command structure and it tends to be an attitude of everybody being in this together. We need to find a way of maintaining that loyalty and team approach while at the same time creating a space whereby real criticism and analysis can take place.

Minor complaints, such as how a Garda in a station dismissed somebody's concerns, should not have to go through the legalities of GSOC. That type of issue should be resolved by local Garda management with the Garda involved feeling comfortable in saying that he or she could have handled that better. A degree of common sense needs to be introduced.

I am sure the Minister is already examining models in the North and elsewhere. We can learn an awful lot from models in the North and in Scotland. They have already been through many teething problems and challenges that we do not need to go through because we can learn from their experience.

I look forward to working with the committee to put forward our recommendations.

Deputy Ross has rightly tried to guarantee in legislation that an independent system will be established for the appointment of senior police officers. I am sure he will agree that when the new Garda authority comes into being, it should have the power to hire the Garda Commissioner, the deputy commissioner and assistant commissioners and, if need be, to fire them. They need to have those teeth from the outset.

We support allowing this Bill to proceed to Committee Stage because we believe it is a worthwhile intervention. However, we hope it will not be necessary and that the new Garda Commissioner will be appointed through an open process managed by the Public Appointments Service and ratified by the new independent Garda authority.

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