Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I am happy to support the Bill. I welcome it, notwithstanding it is a slightly belated response to a situation which caused real disquiet in communities across the country.

The specifics of what happened in North Frederick Street in 2018, which were replicated in other places across the country, caused many of our constituents to reach out to us with a real sense of concern. One of the issues in the North Frederick Street incident was that members of An Garda Síochána were present but almost as bystanders, doing nothing, as individuals carried out a court order in what most people considered a very heavy-handed way. Most people regarded what happened as unacceptable and there was a rightful clamour for legislative change, after years of debate on the issue.

I recall the debate on the regulation of the private security industry very well. There was much talk about the fact that it was unregulated. While there were very professional, well-trained and disciplined individuals involved in providing private security, unfortunately there was an element of thuggery involved that needed to be regulated. We thought in 2004 that the legislation was comprehensive and did that job. The push for a proper response to that legislation has taken some time. The Bill introduced here last November by Deputy Ó Laoghaire was a perfectly acceptable and appropriate response, which put a solution in place and addressed the lacunae in the law. I said as much in the House during the debate on Second Stage. That Bill could easily have formed the basis for any additional amendments the Government wanted to make to the 2004 Act.

I want to make a general point before going into the detail of this Bill. During the previous Dáil, mainly because of the pressure of numbers, we changed the way the Dáil itself functions. We set up supports for Opposition Oireachtas Members to draft legislation to a high standard and the Houses of the Oireachtas also negotiated with the Government a memorandum of understanding on the acceptance and vetting of Private Members' Bills. What used to be the almost exclusive prerogative of the Government to have legislation enacted was fundamentally changed. There has been some significant progress in that regard and I am very pleased that my own Harassment, Harmful Communications and Related Offences Bill 2017 became law last year, with the co-operation of the Minister for Justice and the Minister of State, Deputy James Browne, who is present. That should be the norm as opposed to the exception. It struck me as odd that the framework proposed by Deputy Ó Laoghaire was not simply travelled with and amended, as appropriate, in committee. These provisions could have become law much quicker. All of us should be able to be initiators of legislation, rather than merely responders to proposals for legislation coming from Government, as was the case for so many years.

The list of covered security services set out in the 2004 Act were door supervisor, supplier or installer of security equipment, private investigator, security consultant, security guard, provider of protected forms of transport, locksmith and supplier or installer of safes. One would expect that to be a comprehensive list of all those involved in the private security business but it then transpired that private contractors involved in enforcing court orders were not covered by the Act. Hence the need to include that category of worker in the legislation before us. As the Minister of State indicated, a working group was established and, having consulted with the industry and those directly involved, it came up with some additional amendments with which I want to deal, as well as those including private contractors involved in the enforcement of court orders. There is, however, an exception to that in sections 2 and 3 of the Bill. Section 2 proposes the insertion of an additional category and a definition-----

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