Matt Carthy (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Is ábhar tábhachtach é seo. Caithfimid níos mó a dhéanamh chun stop a chur le daoine óga a bheith páirteach sa choiriúlacht. Ensuring that young people are not drawn into criminality is a crucial part of any effort to reduce crime and antisocial behaviour and make our communities safer. There are two elements to this. First is ensuring that as many young people as possible never actually become involved in criminal activity. The second is ensuring that those who do are rehabilitated and do not engage in further criminality. In particular, we need to ensure that public policy supports those young people who are vulnerable because of difficult upbringings, mental health issues, addiction issues, deprivation and poverty, as well as those who are leaving the care of the State.

Juvenile crime levels have risen in recent years. We have seen sharp increases in reports of theft, robbery, fraud and sexual offences by teenagers. The increase in sexual crimes by young people is a stand-alone and complex problem that needs to be addressed, including through understanding the reasons behind this increase and the role of education, parents and social media. The rise in juvenile crime across the board shows that Government policy is currently failing. These failures are a result of a combination of cuts that were implemented over the past 15 years, failure to invest in communities, failure to invest in youth outreach programmes and in child and youth mental health services, and of course the dramatic reduction in the number of community gardaí. The impact of cuts on community projects, youth services and regeneration projects that were implemented in the aftermath of the economic crash has never been fully examined and, more importantly, has never been fully redressed.

Diverting young people from crime cannot be dealt with separately to how we address economic inequality and deprivation, how we invest in communities, including in housing and public services, and how we give every young person a sense of hope and the opportunity to achieve his or her full potential, no matter the young person's background or class. That means access to housing, education, training, services, facilities and job opportunities. Unless the Government puts funding into communities, youth outreach programmes, child and youth mental health services and sports facilities, particularly in deprived and disadvantaged communities, there is little point in us having debates like this.

Looking at statistics on the educational attainment and skills of those who end up in our prisons, it is clear that supporting young people to stay in school and gain qualifications is a crucial part of any effort to divert them from crime. The educational welfare system needs to be properly resourced and staffed. We need to do much better at tackling recidivism and rehabilitating young people who become involved in crime.

Sinn Féin wants to see the Garda youth diversion programme properly resourced and staffed, with sufficient Garda juvenile liaison officers in place. We also want to see the programme extended to those aged up to 24, in line with international best practice.

Before concluding, I want to address the role of community gardaí. These are the gardaí who know the communities that they serve in and the young people in those communities. They are the gardaí whose job it is to build relationships in the community, be approachable and develop positive relationships with young people in particular while also being visible on the ground. When we look at the increased levels of juvenile crime and antisocial behaviour, we cannot ignore what has happened with community gardaí. There were only 700 community gardaí in the State at the end of last year compared with 1,113 at the end of 2011. At a minimum, we need an additional 500 community gardaí. I hope the Minister for Justice will finally recognise this and act on it.

Of course, we cannot simply police our way to safer communities, but likewise, we cannot build safer communities without adequate policing. Therefore, the responses to these issues have to be targeted, multifaceted, visionary and community centred. The Government is failing on all fronts at the moment.

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