Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Gabhaim buíochas leis an Teachta O'Callaghan. I thank Deputy O'Callaghan for bringing forward the motion. I wholeheartedly welcome Shane's mother and father and his four sisters.

This motion is a testimony yet again to the loving and determined perseverance of Shane's mother, father and sisters, who I salute. It is a scandal of the highest order that such efforts have to be made repeatedly to try to bring into the light the full facts as they relate to the tragic and entirely unavoidable death of this young man. Where would we be if Shane's mother and family had allowed themselves to be beaten down by the weight and might of a judicial system that seems to care nothing for the truth - I do not say that lightly - and only concerns itself with hiding the facts?

On 14 June 2018, a majority of Dáil Members voted in favour of a motion calling for a public inquiry into the death of Shane O'Farrell, and this was followed by a unanimous vote in the Seanad. Support for this motion demonstrated that a majority of the Dáil and Seanad were and are satisfied with the investigations established to date to establish the full facts surrounding the multiple failures of the criminal justice process to prevent the death of Shane O'Farrell. The Minister of State, Deputy Stanton, should hang his head in shame.

This motion is a testimony yet again to the determined perseverance of Shane's mother, father and sisters. It calls on the Government to acknowledge that the Department of Justice and Equality's terms of reference do not address the needs of either the O'Farrell family or the resolution of the Dáil of 14 June 2018. It also calls on the Government to adopt terms of reference for the scoping exercise as drafted by Judge Gerard Haughton, who consulted the O'Farrell family, which they appreciate, as those terms reflect the spirit of the resolution of the House as it is laid before us.

Nothing less than this will satisfy Shane O'Farrell's family, and they are right. I salute them and, in particular, I salute Mrs. O'Farrell. They will never have Shane's young life restored to them, but they are doing this in the interests of other families and other people. I will not call it an accident. It was an incident of outrageous proportions, with the person having been stopped by gardaí only an hour beforehand. This person had been out of the country and was wanted in other jurisdictions. It is disgraceful. That is going on under the Ministers' noses, day in, day out.

Although I hate to digress, we have Deputy Grealish standing up here to talk about the situation of scamming in this country, with moneys being exported, and we are all shouted down as racists. We are not racists. If anything, the Government is racist against its own people. This man should not have died and his family should not have to beg and scrape and borrow. I support the family's neighbours, who came with Mrs. O'Farrell to be outside the gates of Leinster House. We Independents met them very early on. The Government did not want to meet them - all promises, empty promises. Justice must be done, and not only must it be done, it must be seen to be done, and it is not being done. There is something very rotten, sincerely rotten, in the Department of Justice and Equality. It is not only this. It is happening with the prison officers. There is cover-up after cover-up, bullying and intimidation. There is something very rotten in the state of Denmark and something very rotten in the Department of Justice and Equality.

The Minister of State, Deputy Stanton, knows this, although he will be going out of the Department very shortly when the next election is held. He should stand up as a proud Cork man and say what is going on - the cover-ups, the slime, the bullying, the mistreatment of ordinary people. It is disgusting, day in, day out. We saw it in the Garda Síochána with our friend from Cavan. It is going on with the prison officers. There is unbelievable intimidation of good people and the Ministers sit idly by and let it go ahead. They should hang their heads in shame.

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