Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I refer to the direct provision centre in Miltown Malbay, which has been mentioned already. The Minister's response was that he will not rush to judgment, among other things. I ask him, however, to rush to inspection in view of the complaints Deputies have received. I have pictures and detailed accounts which I am not going to go into, but he should certainly rush to inspection because that would be appropriate at this point. Miltown Malbay has been very good in its welcoming of asylum seekers and they have a very positive relationship with the town. However, there are 12 residents in a centre that appears not to have been inspected and it appears somebody is in charge who is not competent to be so. There are many questions about the appropriateness of this situation. We are not complying with our obligations under international law.

We are not complying with our obligations under an EU directive which obliges us to carry out a vulnerability assessment. I mentioned when I was a member of the Joint Committee on Justice and Equality that not a single vulnerability assessment had been carried out. My colleague, Deputy Pringle, has written to the Minister. I will write to him, as I am sure will many other Deputies.

On community policing, the price of democracy is eternal vigilance. In that context, the report from the Policing Authority is vital because it is the monitoring body. I say well done to the Minister for ensuring that happened, although I am sure it could have done it of its own accord and he might clarify that if he gets a chance. It has provided a very precise and succinct report. It certainly gives praise to gardaí, which is well deserved and reflects my experience of them.

The report does, however, highlight a number of issues that the Minister failed to highlight, such as the failure to give a breakdown of the five powers. I cannot go into them because of the time limits, but they include the power of arrest, the power to give directions and so on. The report states that it would have wished in particular to identify those occasions when a garda directed a person and that direction was complied with, but it cannot report on the exercise of the power as it would have wished because the necessary information was not available and so on. The Policing Authority stated that it found it very difficult to understand why it is not possible to indicate which of the powers was invoked on each occasion. It then went on to talk about the importance of recording ethnicity and gives reasons for that. It also referred to the use of spit hoods and provided data on that. They are the important outstanding issues.

The Minister mentioned that gardaí are not armed, but there are armed gardaí at checkpoints and the Policing Authority commented on this in terms of impact and perception. There are reasons for the presence of armed gardaí, such as being involved in an operation, reassigned or so on. They are present and there are issues with that.

It is extraordinary that it has taken the Morris, O'Higgins, Charleton and I do not know how many other tribunals to investigate policing. The Charleton tribunal cost €70 million to come around in a circle and tell us that we need gardaí to be visible, honest, polite, take pride in their work in uniform, serve the people of Ireland and treat their obligation to the public as superior to any false sense that individual policemen and policewomen should stick together. It referred to self analysis. It should not be necessary to have a Morris tribunal or an O'Higgins and so on. What has been missing in the past is the fact that the command structure of An Garda Síochána failed to call itself to account. To be fair to gardaí, those points could apply to any of us as public servants. We would be wise to take them into account. In that context it is vital that the information sought by the Policing Authority be given to it.

It seems to me that the Garda is in an impossible position when it comes to protests. I have the greatest respect for gardaí and feel much safer with them on the streets. They were subjected to an appalling situation in Salthill last week, where young people were out of control. Perhaps if the situation had been anticipated better by management on the previous day it would have been good, but I pay tribute to the behaviour of the gardaí.

As I understand it, the gardaí at the Black Lives Matter protest were very good and worked with the protestors. I have no idea why an investigation is taking place. Protest is fundamental to society and it is fundamental that we would express our outrage at what has happened in America. It is a human response. Clearly, it has to be done in compliance with the guidelines. I ask the Minister to look at that so that protests are allowed with social distancing.

See this speech in context