Results 4,521-4,540 of 18,761 for speaker:Michael McDowell

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Report Stage (Resumed). (5 Apr 2007)

Michael McDowell: That may be so, but it works better than our system. We must be slightly humble and ask why systems of scrutiny at Westminster are far more effective than ours. That is an endemic problem for us.

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Report Stage (Resumed). (5 Apr 2007)

Michael McDowell: It could be due to multi-seat proportional representation or many things, but Westminster seems to do it better than us.

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Report Stage (Resumed). (5 Apr 2007)

Michael McDowell: I am opposed to it for reasons I have outlined.

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Report Stage (Resumed). (5 Apr 2007)

Michael McDowell: All I am saying is that there are many qualifications and that experience covers many things. I do not want it to be thought that this management board is there to supervise human rights in the force.

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Report Stage (Resumed). (5 Apr 2007)

Michael McDowell: No, but I want to try to transform the executive capacity of the force and improve it dramatically. I do not want to be a position where I need to have professors of sociology there. That is not what this is about.

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Report Stage (Resumed). (5 Apr 2007)

Michael McDowell: I can give an oral indication that these issues are ones to keep in the back of one's mind when one is making an appointment. However, I do not want to be in a position where, somehow, professors of social science are more eligible than somebody who has actually managed an organisation.

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Report Stage (Resumed). (5 Apr 2007)

Michael McDowell: I really want experience in the management of a large organisation. Experience in the social sciences does not necessarily qualify one to do that, no more than being a lawyer does. If I was tough on the lawyers earlier, I must also be tough on academics and social scientists. They are not necessarily the people to whom one would give top executive positions. If I may say something——

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Report Stage (Resumed). (5 Apr 2007)

Michael McDowell: I wish to speak about the amendment. Deputy Ó Snodaigh asked about remuneration. It must be flexible. Obviously, one will not pay them more than the Commissioner because that would be——

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Report Stage (Resumed). (5 Apr 2007)

Michael McDowell: It is not a full-time job, rather it is a weekly job. They are non-executive directors. I cannot say it is going to be €20,000 or €50,000. I do not know. However, it must be sufficiently attractive to get somebody of capacity to devote at least one day a week to the job.

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Report Stage (Resumed). (5 Apr 2007)

Michael McDowell: The function of this board is as an executive board. Its function is not to advise the Oireachtas or me, but to get stuck into the executive functions of the Garda Síochána. While I appreciate what the Deputy is getting at, I do not want to go down that road.

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Report Stage (Resumed). (5 Apr 2007)

Michael McDowell: I want to leave that function with the Commissioner.

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Report Stage (Resumed). (5 Apr 2007)

Michael McDowell: It is not intended that the board would have anything to do with the Minister of the day or his responsibilities. I am very anxious that the joint policing committees be rolled out, but their primary relationship is with gardaí at a local level. It is not——

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Report Stage (Resumed). (5 Apr 2007)

Michael McDowell: There is no evaluation currently. I went ahead with a number of the joint policing committees in order to get the CCTV systems up and running. I had boxed myself into a corner as I could not put in a CCTV system without a local policing committee to approve it. There was a slightly arbitrary approach to decide which places got them. I hope to roll them out right across the country. We...

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Report Stage (Resumed). (5 Apr 2007)

Michael McDowell: This provision is designed to allow for special inquiries to be held on a number of aspects of the Garda Síochána, such as administration, operation, practice or procedure or the conduct of members. For example, if it was alleged that members of the Garda were or were not favouring a particular insurance company in a manner that has been recently alleged, but heavily denied in today's...

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Report Stage (Resumed). (5 Apr 2007)

Michael McDowell: Perhaps, but let us suppose that something like that emerged and it was not a matter for the Garda Ombudsman Commission to look at it, I want to be in a position to have an effective means of inquiry to get at the truth of such a matter. In drafting the Garda Síochána Act 2005, we discovered that we had watered down the scope of our capacity to appoint a special inquiry, in anticipation...

Criminal Justice Bill 2007: Report Stage (Resumed). (5 Apr 2007)

Michael McDowell: How long did it take? We had two to three years to do it.

Order of Business (5 Apr 2007)

Michael McDowell: And the Deputy himself.

Order of Business (5 Apr 2007)

Michael McDowell: The Government intends to do more business in the House this month.

Order of Business (5 Apr 2007)

Michael McDowell: No one is keeping Members in the House who no longer have an appetite for doing business. They can go wherever they want.

Order of Business (5 Apr 2007)

Michael McDowell: Deputy Ó Caoláin raised the issue of debating the report prepared by Mr. MacEntee. I believe that report deserves time and consideration, and we will have to come back to consider it in this House, however we agree to do so. When the Deputy calls for a public inquiry into that particular atrocity, he should remember that on 21 November 1974, 21 people were killed in Birmingham. There was...