Results 101-118 of 118 for garda speaker:Michael McNamara

Sex Offenders (Amendment) Bill 2021: Second Stage (Resumed) (18 Nov 2021)

Michael McNamara: ...evil and promote good, particularly in these times. I am yet to meet a politician who did not say up with good and down with evil, but where is the impetus coming from? Is it coming from An Garda Síochána? Has the Garda said it needs additional powers to deal with this matter? Has the Probation Service called for these additional powers? If not, where are these provisions...

Road Traffic (No.2) Bill 2014 [Seanad]: Second Stage (Resumed) and Subsequent Stages (18 Dec 2014)

Michael McNamara: ...people coming in here and they are saying things like, 'I'd have nothing to do with the guards; I wouldn't give them the time of day now.'" This is Ireland where we have always had regard for the Garda and there have always been good relations between the community and the Garda. Whether we like it or we do not, whether it is right or not, there is an increasing perception of unfairness....

Covid-19 (Justice and Equality): Statements (13 May 2020)

Michael McNamara: ...a reasonable excuse to be out of them. One of the excuses was to carry out essential services or go to an essential retail outlet. That gives a huge amount of power to individual members of An Garda Síochána and is a very difficult position to put those individual members in. It is a power I would not feel comfortable having. I would not want to determine whether it is...

Civil Registration (Amendment) Bill 2014 [Seanad]: Second Stage (Resumed) (9 Oct 2014)

Michael McNamara: ...deported, and that Ireland is her home but she would probably spend a lot of money and that it would take about five or six years to sort out the mess. They said she could expect letters from the Garda Síochána, the Garda National Immigration Bureau and that she would have to travel to Dublin frequently. In effect, her time would be wasted and she would probably not be allowed...

Mental Health Policy: Motion [Private Members] (9 Dec 2020)

Michael McNamara: ...to flag the lack of information on suicide in Ireland. The reason that we do not have centralised or up-to-date data is because there are 37 coroners' districts but no centralised database. An Garda Síochána has to investigate causes of death if a deceased person has not been very recently attended to by a doctor. In 2000, a review carried out by the then Department of...

Health (Amendment) Bill 2020: Committee and Remaining Stages (23 Oct 2020)

Michael McNamara: ...was a member before he took office, that our tracing system is not working. We can seek to criminalise the poor for being poor. It will not work because our fines system does not work. We can give An Garda Síochána the job of handing out these notices. I have no doubt but that it will do the job this House assigns to it.

Policing, Security and Community Safety Bill 2023: Report and Final Stages (12 Jul 2023)

Michael McNamara: ...final too. Mr. Shatter was able to say that Mr. Wallace had committed, I believe, a road traffic offence at the Five Lamps and was pulled over. This was information he had gleaned from the then Garda Commissioner. Equally worrying, or even more worrying in some respects, the House may recall that, in the lifetime of this Dáil and during Deputy McEntee’s tenure as Minister...

Criminal Justice (Enforcement Powers) (Covid-19) Bill 2020: Committee Stage (Resumed) and Remaining Stages (3 Sep 2020)

Michael McNamara: ...until morale improves, which is, in effect, what this Bill is about. The policy is to introduce more and more draconian legislation and make things harder and harder for people. The Association of Garda Sergeants and Inspectors, AGSI, has expressed reservations about this legislation. Ordinary rank-and-file gardaí throughout the State do not want it and have said it will bring An...

Offences against the State (Amendment) Act 1998: Motion (23 Jun 2021)

Michael McNamara: ...idea that a non-scheduled offence can be certified for trial in the Special Criminal Court and that cannot be challenged before the courts. I do not have a problem with certifying a trial. The Garda or the DPP might take the view that the trial of a certain person or the trial of somebody for a certain offence might not be capable of being dealt with by the ordinary courts because of the...

Industrial Relations (Members of the Garda Síochána and the Defence Forces) Bill 2015: Second Stage [Private Members] (24 Apr 2015)

Michael McNamara: I will address a number of points that were raised. According to the Minister of State, the right to strike of An Garda Síochána - it was decided that Ireland was in breach of the European Social Charter because this was denied - raised serious issues. I accept this in terms of the security of the State. Deputy Calleary went further and ruled it out as being incompatible with the...

Covid-19 (Health): Statements (11 Jun 2020)

Michael McNamara: ...I urge the Minister to move away from laws which are unenforceable. It slipped out into the media that the movement restrictions in these regulations are not, will not or cannot be enforced by An Garda Síochána. The Minister should move towards addressing the general health regime. The Minister says help is available for people who have mental health issues. In the...

Office of Fiscal Prosecution Bill 2015: First Stage (2 Apr 2015)

Michael McNamara: ...but the offices involved in them have publicly stated that all their resources were used to pursue these investigations and I am concerned that if corporate crimes are being reported to the Garda, be it in the Leas-Cheann Comhairle's constituency of Galway East or in Clare or Limerick, the force does not have the resources or the capability to investigate them. As we are about to rise for...

Bank Bailout and EU-IMF Arrangement: Motion (Resumed) (6 Apr 2011)

Michael McNamara: ...items is €21 billion. We cannot as yet raise these funds in the markets, although the indicators are good for the future. As such, how do the proposers of the motion suggest we continue to pay gardaí, teachers and nurses? How do they propose that we raise the funds to maintain the weakest in our society in the dignity their humanity demands? They cannot say. As the banking system...

Financial Resolutions 2020 - Budget Statement 2021 (13 Oct 2020)

Michael McNamara: ...companies to provide adequate customer service, which they have not, to date, provided. They are in a race to the bottom. The general backdrop to the budget is bizarre. I agree with Deputy Danny Healy-Rae about the number of members of An Garda Síochána who were ordered to go out and sabotage the economy last week. They were ordered to go out and hold people with children...

Health and Criminal Justice (Covid-19) (Amendment) Bill 2021: Committee and Remaining Stages (2 Jun 2021)

Michael McNamara: I begin by apologising to Deputy Kelly. We did not mean to interrupt. Deputy Tóibín and I were agreeing that there were more U-turns on display here tonight than anyone would see at a Garda checkpoint. The Minister was asked a straight question as to whether he would be accepting any Opposition amendments. He said he would like to listen to the discussion on all of the...

Protected Disclosures Bill 2013 [Seanad]: Second Stage (Resumed) (5 Feb 2014)

Michael McNamara: ...than I do. We do not want to create a situation where the media or Members of this House will be the first port of call for a concerned worker - it is welcome that "worker" is defined broadly and includes gardaí and members of the Defence Forces - but it is unreasonable to always expect him or her to begin by reporting internally. The Garda Síochána, for example, is a...

An Bille um an Seachtú Leasú is Tríocha ar an mBunreacht (Cearta Geilleagracha, Comhdhaonnacha agus Cultúir), 2018: An Dara Céim [Comhaltaí Príobháideacha] - Thirty-seventh Amendment of the Constitution (Economic, Social and Cultural Rights) Bill 2018: Second Stage [Private Members] (27 Jan 2021)

Michael McNamara: ...with using that as an excuse to fail completely to address a breach of rights in Ireland. An example is the EuroCOP case taken against Ireland, where it was found that Ireland's treatment of gardaí was a breach of their economic and social rights and that has not been addressed in any meaningful way. A similar decision was made in respect of members of the Defence Forces, which...

Health (Amendment) Bill 2021: Committee Stage (Resumed) and Remaining Stages (25 Feb 2021)

Michael McNamara: ...for a Bill like this to specify a particular type of testing. For example, the type of testing for road traffic offences is never specified in the relevant legislation. It is just stated that the Garda members can have an apparatus and then details of the apparatus will be set out in secondary legislation by the Minister. I have no problem with testing. In fact, it is vital that we...