Ruairi Ó Murchú (Louth, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

We are here to discuss what is obviously a technical Bill. When I heard about the reorganisation and division, and the fact that County Louth was going to be connected with counties Cavan and Monaghan, I had a fear of losing senior gardaí and losing the focus that is needed, particularly in the huge urban settings of Dundalk and Drogheda. Anybody who has watched the news in recent years realises the difficulties we are dealing with there.

I accept that there is a certain logic to the streamlining of services. I accept that there is complete logic to taking the likes of human resources and disciplinary issues away from other gardaí, who will become focused thematically on the vital parts of crime-fighting that are absolutely necessary. None of this will really matter, however, unless we are talking about resources.

I spoke recently to the superintendent in Dundalk and the chief superintendent for County Louth. They spoke about the issue that still relates to the lack of supervision and the need for more sergeants, and how this is holding up operationality in the Garda. This is, therefore, something that will need to be dealt with. It is all well and good and we can have reports and reorganisation but if we do not have the capacity to do business then we will not be doing business.

I will bring the discussion back to what one of the previous Deputies spoke about. A recent "Prime Time" episode on crack cocaine dealing showed one particular estate. The Deputy asked why the gardaí were not taking action in respect of this estate. I imagine parts of Dublin are like parts of my town of Dundalk, where that is hardly the only drug dealing that was going down that day. I imagine there are lots of places where one can find this happening. The reality is that we would need an incredible amount of resources to tackle every incidence of drug dealing.

With regard to that particular estate, I think we need to actually introduce a level of logic with regard to planning. The term that would have come to mind for any other person who has acted as a councillor for any period and who watched that show was "permeability". That is the idea; it sounds great and allows for access and there is no obstacle in a person's way in relation to being able to live an active lifestyle and be able to walk wherever he or she needs to be. The reality in certain working-class estates is that permeability, which is forced upon developers and planners, ends up creating rat runs and areas that are open to drug dealing and antisocial behaviour. The issue then is that an awful lot of councillors in Dundalk and in other areas spend their time trying to get council officials to close them off at a later stage. We need to look at this when we are talking about holistic planning.

This is the reality, however. I was told that the Minister was looking at a relatively serious sized State-level drug dealer - a major operator - and that it takes approximately 28 gardaí to put an operation in place that will probably take a year to get a prosecution. The idea is that if the Minister is putting in those sorts of resources, we will have action. That needs to be followed up by court resources and such.

Let us assume that we are talking about the likes of Dundalk or Drogheda. Obviously, Drogheda had a particular set of resources thrown at it due to the situation that arose there with the vicious feud. We would have to consider that on a localised basis, we are still talking about numbers of at least ten to 20 gardaí, who, to a significant extent, would have to be focused on putting away a major player. Some of these major players, even on a localised level, unfortunately, have become quite clever in how they operate. They use people who are vulnerable. They have an number of cut-outs between themselves and the actual crime and they are usually able to insulate themselves. The Minister is talking about a huge amount of resources, however. We have to have a reality check and look at the entire situation.

The Government has proposed a number of things in relation to citizens’ assemblies. I believe there is general support for that across this House. We really need to get the show on the road, however, if we are talking about the issue of organised crime and the dysfunction we have with regard to the drugs problem. I welcome that there is to be a citizens' assembly regarding drugs but we need to actually see it happen. We need a timeline. We need to take the conversation out of this place and have a real discussion about best practice across the world, whether that is in Portugal, Amsterdam or anywhere else. We need to take a look at what works.

I would also make the argument that this State and this country is incredibly small. If we are looking at changes, we might need to have a wider conversation about the European Union, and, obviously, with Britain as unfortunately, at this point, there are still two jurisdictions on this island. Hopefully, that is something that will be altered in the near future but it is something we must deal at this point.

The Minister visited Drogheda for the launch of the Drogheda Implementation Board. I am quite hopeful that could possibly provide a template for best practice and ensure that with those services out there - for example, the entire family support services, the HSE, the addiction services, as they currently exist and much of the NGO sector - we will be able to cut through some of the red tape, provide funding and make the best of what we have.

A major part of the work will be to point out that there will still be a necessity to fill in gaps, even if we do the absolute best and the promises on prioritisation and Government funding actually occur, because we need huge family supports and a huge level of addiction services and family addiction services. We still have an issue in County Louth and beyond, in counties Meath, Cavan and Monaghan, in that the family addiction support network, based in Dundalk, is still awaiting funding. The promise of funding has been promised, in the sense that the HSE has supposedly been given €70,000, which was promised a significant period of time ago, but it has not made its way down to CHO 8 with criteria and whatever else is needed. Nobody knows whether this will be a continual or retrospective payment. You are dealing with an organisation the gardaí use to provide a resource to families under severe pressure. It is also one of the bodies people approach. Sometimes people who are uncomfortable going directly to the gardaí will point out where drug-debt intimidation is occurring.

We welcome the work being done by the gardaí at a State level and locally, especially in taking on organised crime and criminality and drugs criminals who are ripping apart our communities, but we have to be absolutely realistic about this. Sometimes there can be an oversimplification. Some of the discussion that occurred earlier on that "Prime Time" show asked why those people were not arrested. The fact is we have seen the likes of the drugs squad in Dundalk having a huge impact. We saw a huge number of seizures, especially at the very beginning of the pandemic and that leads to huge debts in the criminal underground, and the pressure goes downward and we have had a huge increase in drug-debt intimidation, and that is of mothers, grandmothers, fathers, uncles, brothers and sisters. They get the knock on the door, the window is smashed and they get the threat that what is coming next will be a hell of a lot more serious and they have seen it happen. I am fed up of WhatsApp messages or videos of houses on fire, acts of antisocial behaviour related to drugs and the damage it does and I absolutely hate looking at messages at this point in time. We need to get incredibly serious on this.

I welcome what was said earlier. There are positive things about the youth justice strategy and some positives about this reorganisation, but if are to be serious, we need to have a holistic multi-agency solution, which means we have to have a real conversation on how we will deal with this. Like I said, we need to have a wider solution, because it is not just about the gardaí, but it is about a health-led strategy and one that works. The gardaí will tell you they are fed up that they cannot access the addiction services required. We basically have a system that does not work. We need to get real and we are nowhere next to being real about this.

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