Bríd Smith (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

In fairness, most of the focus so far has been on Taylor and Callinan. Far more needs to be done for public accountability as regards the actions of gardaí at all ranks and all levels. My confidence in the new Garda Commissioner Drew Harris was fairly shaky in the beginning given his record in dealing with the historical legacy in Northern Ireland but also given that his first public outing was his response to what happened on North Frederick Street, which was fairly bad. He said that the unfortunate thing about the gardaí wearing the hoods was that they did not also have their helmets on. The Minister's own response was even more pathetic when he said, in a knee-jerk reaction at the time, that we need to start banning people from taking photographs of gardaí. That probably illustrates more than anything else the lack of accountability to the public in terms of how the Garda will deal in the future with the most vulnerable in our society and with those who protest against the system itself. The Garda action in this case in protecting property rights against citizens does not inspire confidence. There is a far greater job to be done on how the Garda is made accountable to the public.

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