Aodhán Ó Ríordáin (Dublin Bay North, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I will be sharing time with my colleague, Deputy Duncan Smith. The Labour Party will support Deputy Ward's motion.

I have sympathy with what the previous speaker said about not demonising young people and, indeed, particular areas. There is an area in my constituency which is having a particular issue at the moment. The Minister knows that because I wrote to her, the Garda Commissioner and the local Garda station about it. I do not want to name the park in question but I met residents of the area on Friday evening to discuss the issue. Concerns about fireworks and antisocial behaviour are so serious that local residents, who are proud of their area, feel they cannot go into the park after lunchtime. That is a particularly distressing message to get as a public representative. The park has been well resourced and people feel proud of it but it has now come to a stage that residents feel they cannot go into it after lunchtime. We are still in September and, as other speakers have said, this problem is only going to get worse.

A Garda station has been promised for Dublin 13 and Dublin 17. It was announced by the assistant Garda commissioner in May 2019. I raised a Topical Issue matter about it only last week and was not encouraged by the response I got. Every time we speak about antisocial behaviour or policing, I am going to raise this issue.

A crime task force was also promised for the north side of Dublin during the general election campaign on the basis that, as is the case in the north inner city, we cannot police one's way out of crime. We must speak to young people and talk about youth development, oral language, literacy, employment and health. A wide range of issues must be considered when we speak about crime, disadvantage and antisocial behaviour. The Government cannot police its way out of the problem. I have made this case every time there has been a shooting, gun crime or murder. I have said that we need a Mulvey-style commission or task force on the north side of Dublin and another in Drogheda. That was agreed when the general election was called. I want delivery of those task forces and I do not accept that we must wait for the Covid-19 emergency to pass before we can start to move on it. We can see that antisocial behaviour, disconnection and disengagement are still issues. The incidence of firework crime and antisocial behaviour has increased in September and is likely to increase further in October.

I mean what I will say next with the greatest of respect to all speakers and am not in any way questioning the bona fides of anyone who has spoken on this motion from Government or Opposition parties. It is really not good enough to come into this Chamber and speak of resources that Dublin City Council needs for its work in community development and estate management and to adequately secure parks when members of parties in government and opposition last night joined together to cut €12 million of Dublin City Council funding which could have been used to tackle the very issues we are talking about.

Politics can be difficult and means making hard choices. With the greatest of respect to those who have spoken about resources, development and investing in communities, I ask them to speak to their councillors because yesterday at a Dublin City Council meeting, a number of parties in government and opposition voted to rob my city of €12 million that could have gone a long way towards addressing the issues that we are talking about today.

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