Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Leas-Cheann Comhairle for the opportunity to discuss the impact of gangland and organised crime on communities across the country. It is a timely discussion as the Government sets to introduce tougher laws to further support An Garda Síochána in taking on the gangs that try to inflict misery on communities.

I am pleased to report that significant progress has been made by An Garda Síochána in the past decade in dismantling organised crime. Since 2015, more than 1,300 people have been arrested and €324 million of drugs seized and, since spring 2016, 80 interventions have been made by An Garda Síochána in the context of threats to life. While we should not underestimate the difficulties the Garda faces in tackling organised crime activity, we continue to see the significant results of its efforts in the arrests made and the people brought before the courts, both here and, importantly, in other jurisdictions, as well as the ongoing drugs and firearms seizures. This is commendable work and the Government will continue to support An Garda Síochána in its efforts.

All present are aware of the judgments of the Special Criminal Court on Monday. Although there may be a significant focus on one of the court’s decisions, it is important that we acknowledge the convictions of two other people for facilitating the brutal and callous attack in the Regency Hotel in 2016. The events and murder on that day remain the subject of a live investigation and I do not wish to say anything to interfere with that painstaking work by An Garda Síochána. I do, however, want to send out a very strong message: justice always prevails. The criminal gangs causing fear, violence and murder across this country can run and they can try to hide but An Garda Síochána will never stop pursuing and dismantling them. Crucially, that pursuit does not and will not stop at the country's borders.

I am proud to state that An Garda Síochána has built law enforcement coalitions across the world. Just as these criminals seek to operate across countries and continents, leaving misery and pain everywhere they go, An Garda Síochána has built alliances with colleagues in the UK, United States, Europe and South America, as well as with its partners in Interpol and Europol. These gangs have been left under no illusion. Wherever they try to go, we will follow. We will be there and justice will follow. That is why the Government has supported An Garda Síochána in establishing a powerful international network of Garda liaison officers in Madrid, Paris, London, the Hague, Washington D.C., Bogota, Abu Dhabi and Bangkok. I am pleased to confirm to the House that there are more locations to come. These Garda liaison officers are crucial in building alliances that are vital in the modern era of fighting what is clearly transnational crime. I thank and pay tribute to the members of An Garda Síochána serving in these roles abroad, as well to their families.

As legislators, we will and must always do our part in equipping An Garda Síochána with the tools it needs to end the chokehold these gangs try to exert on families, communities and individuals in Ireland. A major priority shared by Members across the House must be to ensure we prevent the next generation from being used as pawns and runners in the criminal underworld. Children are being exploited by these criminals. Kids are being deceived by criminal networks into believing crime can bring wealth, bling and a party lifestyle but, in reality, it brings death, fear, debt and much more. Later this year, the Oireachtas will move - I hope to have cross-party support on this - to outlaw the grooming of children into crime by making it an offence for an adult to compel, coerce, direct or deceive a child for the purpose of engaging in criminal activity or for an adult to induce, invite, aid, abet, counsel or procure a child to engage in criminal activity. This law will help to disrupt the ruthless pursuit of kids and teenagers by criminal networks.

We will and must do much more than that, however. We will hit these organised crime gangs in the only place that seems to matter to them - their pockets. Since its inception, the Criminal Assets Bureau, CAB, has been a world leader in seizing the ill-gotten gains of criminals. The major decision to establish CAB has been incredibly successful. The bureau has been at the forefront of fighting organised crime in this country and disrupting the activities of criminal gangs by depriving them of their ill-gotten gains. More than €200 million has been returned to the Exchequer and the taxpayers of this country since 1996 as a result of its efforts. CAB has been recognised internationally by law enforcement agencies in the context of investigations, tracing and forfeiture. I want to ensure it remains a world leader. One can never stand still or become complacent because the criminals always try to get ahead. That is why I intend to publish legislation in the coming weeks to reform CAB and strengthen it further. We will bring forward a law that will give new powers to CAB to restrict criminals from thwarting the work of the bureau through vexatious court challenges. Let us be honest. What we are now seeing from criminals and ruthless leaders of organised gangs is that they try to continue to enjoy their assets - to live in the mansion and drive around in the flashy car - for lengthy periods by using delaying tactics and repeatedly taking vexatious cases to the court, all while enjoying the benefit of those ill-gotten gains. That cannot happen any more. It must stop and we need to change the law to make sure that it does. The new measures we will bring forward will automatically appoint a receiver to a property or other asset when a decision is made that the asset is a proceed of crime, pending the final disposal order. The receiver will get control of the mansion or other property while the final disposal order is being worked through the legal process.

We take the property and the asset off the criminal and ensure it is managed by the receiver and will not be available for use by the person being pursued by CAB during this period, which has lasted up to seven years. This will help to deprive criminals continuing to use the proceeds of crime.

I will include these measures in the Proceeds of Crime (Amendment) Bill 2023. This legislation will also include plans to reduce the period that must normally elapse before criminal proceeds may be confiscated following a court decision that an asset is a proceed of crime from seven years to two years; grant further powers to CAB to allow it to more effectively and efficiently share information with other State agencies and with law enforcement in other jurisdictions; and grant anonymity to former non-Garda bureau officers, other former bureau staff, experts from regulatory or investigative bodies, or independent experts such as financial analysts who are occasionally contracted by the bureau when called upon to give evidence at the proceeds of crime hearings.

The Criminal Assets Bureau now operates in communities across our country. An important part of CAB's remit is its network of divisional asset profilers who are trained by the bureau and tasked locally with preparing asset profiles on local criminals and referring them back to CAB. It is vital that everyone sees and knows that crime does not pay and that we modernise the law around the Criminal Assets Bureau to ensure it has the tools to keep ahead of the criminals and gangs and get the money and value of property that has been ill-gotten through crime back from the criminal and into our State coffers in order that we can start spending it on public services and all the other fine and important things we regularly discuss in this House.

This principle of ensuring that crime does not pay is at the heart of our new community safety innovation fund. As colleagues will know, this is a fund that reinvests the proceeds of crime seized by CAB in local projects to help improve community safety. It will take the money off the criminals, put it into an innovation fund and give it to a community to support it and help make it safer. Last year, a total of €2 million was granted through that fund to 22 projects across the country. From 2023, the figure will be €3 million. Along with the new community safety partnerships and community safety plans, it is central to our collective commitment to build stronger, safer communities. Applications for the 2023 fund are now open and I encourage interested communities and groups to apply.

At the centre of our goal of building stronger, safer communities and tackling organised crime has to be a bigger and stronger An Garda Síochána. The Government is committed to ensuring the Garda has the resources it needs to fight crime, with record funding of €2.14 billion allocated to the Garda Vote. This includes provision for the recruitment of up to 1,000 additional Garda members and 400 additional Garda staff over the course of 2023. Since the Garda College in Templemore reopened in 2015, we have seen a steady increase in Garda numbers. As of the end of March 2023, there were 14,036 Garda members, an increase of almost 10% since 2015 when there were 12,816 Garda members. Commissioner Harris and I have been clear that we do not see our commitment to have 15,000 Garda members as a limit. We want to reach that target and push on further. We are now back in a phase of sustained, steady recruitment, including our most recent recruitment campaign which closed just last week. As the recruitment campaign stated, being a member of An Garda Síochána is a tough job. We must acknowledge that and we must never forget the risks the men and women of An Garda Síochána face in protecting us. However, it is an impactful job and one that is worth doing and makes a difference. I believe that interest in joining An Garda Síochána remains strong and I hope to be in a position to outline details of the number of applications received through the latest campaign very shortly.

Covid-19 presented difficulties and I am aware that people do not want to speak about Covid again. While I understand that, this is an important point to make because it resulted in the Garda College being closed a number of times. We are now back at the point where a steady stream of recruits is entering the Garda College every 11 weeks. We intend running that annual recruitment campaign and getting back into an annual cycle of recruitment and constant inflow of new recruits to the Garda College.

The resources allocated to the Garda in recent years have enabled the Commissioner to assign extra resources to our specialist units involved in tackling organised crime, including the armed support unit, the Garda National Drugs and Organised Crime Bureau, the Garda National Bureau of Criminal Investigation and CAB. As we push on into An Garda Síochána’s second century, a bigger Garda, with more Garda staff freeing up front-line gardaí for core policing duties will further strengthen its bond with our communities. This will be strengthened through the new community policing structures, with community policing teams serving local people.

The challenges of modern policing mean we must move forward with specialist units in areas such as cybercrime, domestic, sexual and gender-based violence, drugs, organised crime, as well as many others. These units have been central to the many successes of An Garda Síochána in recent years, particularly in the area of organised crime. We will complement these great successes with a strengthened community policing service. Every single day, criminal gangs are adapting their behaviour to escape the glare of An Garda Síochána. That is why it is essential we stand shoulder to shoulder with gardaí and equip them with the tools and the technology they need.

Shortly, as Members will be aware, this House will be called on to renew the Offences Against the State Act and the Special Criminal Court. Sadly, there are political parties in this House, some of which aspire to be in Government, which abscond when it comes to taking this tough decision on an annual basis. They walk out or abstain but now is the time for clarity on these matters. This week, we have seen a Special Criminal Court working and carrying out its duties. Those who doubt its role in the criminal justice system need to be scrutinised on what their alternative is. As Minister for Justice, I believe there are trials which would not have successfully taken place before the Special Criminal Court had some parties in this House been in government. I also believe that if the Special Criminal Court did not exist, those parties in government would have exposed men and women on juries in gangland and paramilitary trials into the direct eye line of criminal gangs and subversives. That would put people at risk and weaken our criminal justice system. It is essential that this House, in a few weeks' time, reaffirm its support for the Special Criminal Court and people clarify their positions in this regard.

I also wish to comment in my other Government capacity as Minister for Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science. A key part of this is supporting communities. I spoke about how we need to take our children from the clutches of criminal gangs and pass criminal justice legislation on tackling the grooming of children. I spoke of children being convinced that there is some sort of glamorous life associated with crime rather than one of debt, death and fear. We also need to ensure we support these communities, a view I know we all share. The community safety innovation fund is one way of taking money from criminals and putting it into communities. The work led by my colleague, the Minister of State, Deputy Browne, in youth diversion and many other youth justice projects is key to this. So too is ensuring that every child and adult has an opportunity to access education, upskill and reskill. That is why, in the capital city alone, we have invested millions of euro in establishing the new Technological University Dublin in the heart of inner-city Dublin, with plans to expand its reach directly into Cabra. In Limerick, a city which once knew all about warring criminal gangs, we have invested in the new Technological University of the Shannon. This has allowed Limerick to develop into a busy, popular place and a hive of industry, innovation and opportunity for thousands of students from across this country.

These important investments must show that there is no place out of reach for any young person, no matter what their background is or what their mum and dad did before them, to access education, or employment. There is no greater leveller than education. It is the greatest weapon in the world. Together with tougher laws, education is the key to ending the cycle of crime and deprivation and taking communities back from organised crime. I am excited about working in my current dual role, with the Minister of State, Deputy Browne, during 2023 to see what more we can do on prison education and educational opportunities for the children of prisoners and in disadvantaged communities.

I welcome the opportunity to contribute to this debate. I know that this House stands four-square behind An Garda Síochána in its excellent ongoing work in tackling organised crime and dismantling gangs.

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