Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I am happy to speak briefly on the Bill. As the explanatory memorandum makes clear, the Bill provides for a mechanism to take evidence in the State from a member of An Garda Síochána for the purposes of certain inquiries held in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. I resent calling it this, as Northern Ireland is part of Éire as far as I am concerned.

The Bill also provides for An Garda Síochána and the Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission to enter into agreements for co-operation with a police service, law enforcement agency or another relevant person or body outside the State. When the Minister published the Bill in June, he noted that in addition to this international co-operation, the Bill is about enhancing the co-operation being provided to ongoing coroner's inquests in Northern Ireland into historical deaths, and there are many of them. We are also told the legislation will further underpin the Government's commitment to co-operate fully with the framework of the measures set out in the Stormont House Agreement and I hope so. It is something we all support.

We are a small island off the west coast of Europe and though we have different law enforcement agencies, there is surely plenty of scope to co-operate where and when possible. This is a welcome approach that has been adopted for many years, ever since An Garda Síochána and the Police Service of Northern Ireland, with the support of the Department of Justice and Equality and the Department of Justice in Northern Ireland initially published their cross-Border policing strategy. The strategy aimed to build on existing practical and strategic co-operation and identify a number of key strands of work where the public service feels that co-operation and supporting legislation can become even stronger. I note this with regard to where the public service supports legislation that co-operation can be even stronger. The public service? What are we? We are meant to be legislators. Does this mean the public service is controlling the agenda? I have many fears about this. The Bill is very much within this framework. It is also reflected in recent comments made by the new Garda Commissioner, Drew Harris, and the PSNI Deputy Chief Constable, Stephen Martin, when they both stressed the importance of maintaining partnership arrangements that are facilitated by the two jurisdictions' membership of the EU. I wonder what will happen with Brexit and everything else.

It is fairly evident that we should support partnership arrangements where possible. Of course we should and it goes beyond being spoken about. This is especially the case where they can lead to greater common security for all of the people of Ireland.

Many people have spoken about legacy issues. What about the late Pat Finucane? He was a wonderful solicitor doing his job. What about the victims of the Omagh bomb? We are heading again to its anniversary. I raised it many times in the House with the former leader of Fine Gael and former Taoiseach, Deputy Enda Kenny. When he was the leader of the Opposition he spoke to Michael Gallagher at an Ard-Fheis and told him he would not get justice under Fianna Fáil but would under Fine Gael. What happened? He abandoned him. What happened there was a travesty of justice and there are many more such travesties, such as Loughinisland and the Kingsmill massacre. Will the Bill do anything for them? No it will not because we are burying the legacy. I support Deputy O'Callaghan and others who look for international people to come in to try to deal with this because we are too small a country to deal with it.

There are many things in the Minister's Department that are not well. At present, there is an investigation in Limerick, just up the road from me, in which senior gardaí are being questioned. Six months ago, I handed the Minister a dossier on the Irish Prison Service and Limerick. Today, I raised the issue of free legal aid with the Taoiseach. Of course, I always accept that people are innocent until proven guilty. Prisoners convicted by the court go into the prison in Limerick but the situation there is not right. There are now investigations going on and I salute the Garda Commissioner, Mr. Harris, on doing this. Will the next arrests be of senior prison officers? This is what is going on. We need to clean up our own act before we start these international treaties.

We have nothing of which to be proud. The corruption and the carry on involving the Prison Officers Association, POA, and the senior officers in this country are frightening. It is a time bomb waiting to explode and it is going to explode on the watch of the Minister, or someone else's if he is gone shortly. I warned him about this issue some six months ago. I handed him a dossier of information concerning what is going on. I am referring to the bullying and intimidation of good, decent, honest prison officers. They are being bullied and intimidated into making statements and accepting statements that are untrue, false in the extreme and very damaging to the careers, families and integrity of good prison officers. This is happening on the watch of the Minister. I am not blaming him personally. I did, however, hand him a dossier of information but he never responded to me.

This is going to blow up in his face. I am told that at the moment there is a very selective and secretive, and rightly so, unidentified unit set up by Commissioner Drew Harris to investigate corruption among senior and middle-ranking members of the Garda. I am not talking about ordinary officials or gardaí. I welcome the establishment of that unit. It is now going to move on to investigate officers of the Irish Prison Service. That is right and proper. The cartels and the vagabonds are not only on the streets, they are also operating in the prisons. They have co-operation from senior prison officers and, unfortunately, members of An Garda Síochána. People are innocent until proven guilty but arrests have been made. I do not know much about them. The sooner this is sorted out, the better.

I am referring to bullying and intimidation. I think that the POA union is intimidating, threatening and bullying good, honest officials doing their daily work to protect us here and to keep people who are sent to prison safe, first of all, and incarcerated to do their punishment. Those decent officers are being bullied and intimidated. Hearings are going on which are charades. Senior union officials are sitting in arbitration and finding people guilty. They told one prison officer that he would never again be allowed back into the union because he dared to ask questions. What is going on here under the auspices of the Department of Justice and Equality?

We can deal with these international affairs and I support them. We saw, however, issues regarding where information was given to An Garda Síochána in respect of the Omagh bombings and other incidents. I supported the Minister's earlier Bill but I am not supporting this Bill. We are dancing around on the head of a pin while huge, explosive issues are going to come down the track regarding what is going on inside our prisons. We can see examples of what is going on all over the country. I am referring to drugs and all of the other things going on inside prisons. Criminals are operating better inside than outside and they cannot do that without co-operation. That is not because of the ordinary prison officers. It is because there is co-operation at very senior levels and intimidation and bullying of people who dare to be whistleblowers and do an honest day's work for an honest day's pay.

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