Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Deputy McDonald raised the scoping inquiry into the death of Shane O'Farrell. I met with the family during the summer. The Government agreed to facilitate the family with a copy of the scoping inquiry report. The Government has not yet considered the report in deference to the family's wishes at that time. I will meet with the family again, and I understand a date has now been agreed by my office and the family. The Government has to give consideration to the scoping inquiry. It did take three years, but this was beyond my control. The inquiry was established more than three years ago, and once such an inquiry is established, the chairperson goes through it. This is a comprehensive report. It is fair to say that not all of it meets with the approval of the family, but the Government must consider this report in respect of the next steps.

Turning to Deputy Crowe's contribution, I commend him on his encyclopaedic knowledge of the detail of Garda rosters. This is impressive work and I hear what he is saying but I do not interfere in the operational decisions of the Commissioner of An Garda Síochána regarding how the Garda is organised. More generally, however, in terms of employees, and gardaí in particular, if the home environment is better and so on, then people will perform better. Likewise, with the work environment. The Deputy said changes are coming on stream that could be difficult. I will talk to the Minister for Justice who is the conduit in respect of matters concerning Garda policy more generally. Turning to the Deputy's wider issue, disciplinary action taken in respect of any agency must always be balanced and fair. People's names do need to be cleared if errors have been made, and I do not know any specific details regarding any specific cases, but speaking generally, people are entitled to natural justice and due process in all situations.

Deputy Bacik again raised the O'Connell Street issue. More gardaí are being trained on an ongoing basis. This is process is continuous now concerning the number of trainees. We do need more foot patrols and we also need a stronger community gardaí presence. A substantial number of those emerging from Templemore have been deployed in the capital. This remains the case. In addition, we need more specialisation and this is also happening. There has been a fundamental reform of the policing system in recent years. This has continued, as I said in my original reply.

Moving to Deputy Boyd Barrett's contribution, we all have representatives on the Houses of the Oireachtas Commission which, essentially, runs these Houses. It organises and is responsible for policy here. I do not know whether these issues have been raised with the commission. There are established employee–employer relationships and pay agreements, etc., and relativities apply in this context. These, therefore, are issues that can be progressed through the existing channels in this respect. I will look into this and ascertain the current position in respect of any discussions that may be under way.

In respect of Deputy Paul Murphy's question, I did not hear Deputy Kehoe make those comments. I would not agree with nor approve of those comments because drug addiction is very difficult for the individual in the first instance. In our view, this must be about understanding the issues in respect of rehabilitation and helping people to come off addiction and providing the services to enable this to happen on a continuing and consistent basis. I do not accept that our model is criminalisation driven. I do not accept this at all. For 30 years now, we have had a strong public health dimension to drugs in different iterations. Fianna Fáil has strongly supported drug task forces. The Deputy should know this. Previous Fianna Fáil Ministers of State over the past 25 years did a hell of a lot in this area. I think it was the former Deputy and Minister, Pat Rabbitte, who set up drug task force areas. This approach was continued by subsequent Ministers of State such as Noel Ahern, John Curran, Eoin Ryan and many more.

We are anxious to intervene in communities at ground level. We should condemn the traffickers and the drug barons who are destroying our young people and our city. We have seen this in respect of the criminal gangs that have done great damage to the city of Dublin and to the country through selling drugs, getting people hooked on them and destroying the lives of those individuals and their families as a result. We must have a health-based approach as the key approach to this issue. Education is also important at the earlier stages, in respect of building up people's self-esteem in our education programmes.

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