Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I have no other way of doing it only telling the truth. Free legal aid is being abused all over the country and it has to be curtailed and reined in. I am asking the Minister of State to do that now. I am talking about the victims of crime and the people who have been robbed. I know of a case where the person whose money was taken went into the Garda station to identify the people and he asked had the person the change or the money he took or had he money left. The answer was that he had but it was being kept until later. That is absolutely ridiculous. More or less, it was being kept to pay for cigarettes for the person who was apprehended. God almighty. I do not know. It seems to me that the victims of crime are not looked after properly. They do not get the attention they deserve even after assaults. It seems to me, and to a lot of people, that it is the perpetrators who are looked after by way of free legal aid and every other chance they can get even if they are continuous offenders.

See this speech in context