Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I am very glad to have the opportunity to speak on the legislation before the House. As the Minister has rightly indicated, this is part of a comprehensive reform agenda. It is a technical measure, but is part of a suite of very substantial change. The Minister will know I have been advocating change in An Garda Síochána for a very long time, since my involvement in various inquiries. The Garda itself wants a fundamental shift in its structures and so on. Thus, I very much welcome the establishment of the overall and detailed policing review entailed and reported by the commission.

This particular measure creates a new operational model for An Garda Síochána. The objective, as stated, has been part of the general objective of the reforms, namely, to provide more front-line gardaí who are visible to, and accessible to, the community. If that does not come to pass, the whole reform agenda will not have been successful, because people want to see gardaí in their own areas, in their own communities; they want to be able to recognise them and have frank conversations with them. Co-ordination and management under these proposals is now to be done at the larger divisional level. As we have heard, there are to be no more Garda districts. Like the trawl that my own former Department, that of Public Expenditure and Reform, had to go through, one must go through every statute to find where there is reference to a Garda division. That throws up hundreds of statutes, often going back to Victorian times. That is why the Bill is a little convoluted and technical. Most people are familiar with the old Garda district headed up by the old structure of a local superintendent in charge. It will take a while to have the public understand a different model and an allegedly more sophisticated management structure is now to be put in place. It is a more sophisticated structure for a more sophisticated and indeed more challenging time. Instead of 28 Garda districts we are going to have 19 Garda divisions. Each division, instead of being divided geographically into Garda districts under the charge of a superintendent, will be divided by function.

Four specific functions are set out. Community engagement is the first, along with the vital element of community policing and the more contentious issue of roads policing. In many ways community and roads policing comprise the function that most impacts on people. That is where most normal people who are not criminals interact with An Garda Síochána. As such it is a pivotally important one.

The second area is the one of crime, including criminality, security and intelligence. It struck me as odd that immigration is to be placed in this crime function area. Why is immigration in with crime, as opposed to being in with community engagement? It seems to me that is the wrong place for it. If I may be forgiven for saying so, it indicates a mindset I do not think is particularly positive. The whole issue of immigration should not be a matter of saying these people are potential criminals to be vetted but rather that they are part of a new community to be integrated. We will debate this issue late but it strikes me the issue of immigration would certainly fit more properly into the community subset rather than the crime one.

The third area is performance assurance, which is extremely important. That comprises standards evaluation, internal discipline and engagement with the Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission, GSOC, or its successor organisation. Openness to public engagement and explanation is critically important. In my period in this House, I have had numerous cases where there was an unfortunate interaction between a member of the public and An Garda Síochána. I am talking about law-abiding people who had an unfortunate experience. A simple explanation and often, a very simple apology, would have sorted the problem but everybody must become technical about this, if I can put it like that. I can give chapter and verse about a number of instances where law-abiding, respectful people had their confidence in An Garda Síochána fundamentally undermined for want of someone simply acknowledging a mistake and saying: "we shouldn't have done that and we apologise". I hope the performance assurance division will take on board these sort of measures and ensure there is a proper modern face to An Garda Síochána. It is the same for people going into a Garda station. Obviously, in Covid times we now have screens and things but if you go into any modern interaction with business, the whole idea is that you are not behind a screen, that you actually talk to people and you have your privacy respected, and that is not the case currently. That also links to the issue of having proper built infrastructure such that there is private space. Thankfully, in Wexford we now have a brand-new Garda divisional headquarters but we had a miserable one. Thankfully, I was in a position to advocate for it in government. I remember going in and trying to have private conversations while there was a queue of people waiting to talk at the hatch. A sergeant had to be put out of his office so I could go in and talk to a Garda officer. That is crazy stuff and I am afraid such situations still prevail in many stations. Thus the capital investment side must be done in parallel to ensure the performance assurance we are talking about actually comes to pass.

Another element is the area of business services, which I understand is to be headed up by a civilian. It comprises finance, logistics and human resource management. That is a good thing. The notion, either in the Civil Service or in local government, that one gets promoted and becomes a human resource specialist is fanciful in modern times. It is a skill set one must be trained and specialist in. One does not become a HR person or a financial expert simply because one gets promoted. That is daft. There is also an issue we can talk about again, that is, the notion a person must go into An Garda Síochána as a recruit in Templemore.

I have met people who are specialists in other areas who would love to come back to Ireland and join An Garda Síochána but they cannot do so because people must go in at base level to join the force. There is to be change now, whereby people can come in at the most senior levels and I would like to see that pan out.

Change is always difficult, as I know from my time as a Minister for five years charged with public service reform. My experience is that it is not only difficult, it is also very challenging because, by and large, everybody sees how everybody else can change for the better but not themselves, somehow. There is an innate and often undermining resistance to change. There needs to be a determination about this and I am very glad the structure is there to drive this change, headed by the Taoiseach. There have been a few attempts at this reform that have never quite made it to completion. The approach to the ongoing change must also be constantly communicated to everybody in the community. Quite often what we do in here and indeed, what An Garda Síochána and other State agencies do, is debated internally at great length. We talk about it, documentation is circulated, we have updated reports and implementation reviews and we are all very well versed but nobody outside knows anything about it. We need to ensure that we bring communities with us. Most of all, these changes must pay visible dividends. We must ensure that we are not changing for the sake of change but because we have a vision for a better police force in this country. We must be able to give assurances to people about how that will be manifest and visible to them.

Ireland, by international comparison, has a relatively low crime rate but the most debilitating thing for most citizens, both young and old, is the fear of crime. There are many people who actually trade on fear and some do so commercially. We witness occasional outrageous attacks on both young people and old people. It could be a young person walking home from work or from a place of entertainment at night who is viciously attacked, and we have seen cases like that recently, or it could be an old person being attacked in the home. The implication of that, not just for the victims directly involved but for everybody, is very serious. I know how old people live in fear when they read about such incidents; it changes the quality of their life fundamentally. That is something on which we all need to be focused. The very understandable fear of crime does immeasurable damage to people's quality of life and we need to be able to assuage such fear by having contact points and response times. I know the Minister has a lot of responsibility now as she is overseeing more than one Department, but when we hear of 999 calls not being responded to, that is shocking for people and cannot be allowed. I am concerned about the reviews we have had in recent times of what have been classified as "scandals", like the breath-test issue. Whatever came of it? Who is ever accountable? It is shocking. We all do our hand-wringing but who is ever held responsible for these things? If nobody is responsible, then nobody is accountable.

The Bill is described as technical in nature and I have it described it thus myself. It is a really important step towards the change that we need to bring about. The structural change to be implemented is one that I support and welcome. I am obviously glad that the divisional headquarters for my own area of Wexford and Wicklow will be in Wexford town. That is a matter of geography, the fact that there is a very fine, brand new divisional headquarters there and also the fact that there is a very good road system between those particular areas. The proximity of Rosslare Port is also important, now and into the future, as a strategic link with Europe and also because of the dangers that obviously come from that.

On the issue of liaison with local communities, as the Minister knows, joint policing committees were provided for under the 2005 Garda Síochána Act and were a truly important innovation. They are going to be modified now but the work they do addresses some of the concerns I have expressed. The committees allow local communities and their representatives to say what is important to them, what is causing fear among people and to ask what An Garda Síochána is going to do about it. The fact that the committees are public fora and are responded to by An Garda Síochána is extremely important. I hope they will be strengthened in this process and not diluted. I have been contacted by councillors who are fearful that there will be fewer councillors, for example, involved in the new police liaison committees and I would like the assurance of the Minister that this will not be the case. Currently, the district superintendent usually attends meetings of the joint policing committees to explain what is going on in his or her geographical district. Obviously, divisions will now cover a much wider geographical area so there is no geographical superintendent to attend. Who is to attend? Will it be, in every case, the chief superintendent? Probably not, I would think. Is it to be a designated superintendent like, for example, the superintendent involved in community policing for the entire division or is it be a lesser ranked individual? I hope it is not downgraded.

As we make profound changes to modernise An Garda Síochána, I seek assurances from the Minister that we will explain those changes to people in very great detail, that there will be tangible benefits to local policing that people can see on the ground and that local representatives will be able to articulate their particular concerns at a local level to a senior member of An Garda Síochána and have those concerns answered in a public forum. That is really important. How that is to be done is not clear from the documentation that has been circulated to date. I do not think it would be a good thing if a less senior person was simply to attend, pro forma. We need to have people with authority to speak authoritatively on behalf of An Garda Síochána in those discussions.

While I welcome the general changes recommended, there is one change about which I am very concerned. I have signalled this at every opportunity and do so again now. After the Commission on the Future of Policing in Ireland reported, I met the chairperson, Ms Kathleen O'Toole, to discuss a specific issue. One of the fundamental aspects of the reforms that were carried out in terms of giving confidence to people was to take the system of appointing senior members of the force out of the hands of An Garda Síochána and give it to the Policing Authority. It is now proposed to give it back to An Garda Síochána. Without reference to anybody in An Garda Síochána, which is made up of exemplary men and women, the notion that they would make senior appointments themselves is invidious and wrong. It creates a club wherein people must comply with the rules within the organisation if they want to get promotion. That would be a significant and retrograde step and in terms of that recommendation, I hope the Minister will think again.

I am very supportive of the rest of the recommendations. I do not know whether the Minister will be there to present this but I ask her to convey my view that it is really important this is done by an independent entity. There is some talk about using the Public Appointments Service.

4 o’clock

The process must be completely independent and must not involve the senior echelons of An Garda Síochána making internal senior promotions because that provides a conformity where one either conforms to the rules of the club if one wants promotion or one does not and is excluded from promotion. I look forward to debating with the Minister all of these points and all the other proposals for reform.

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