Michael Finucane (Fine Gael)

Coming from the mid-west, I welcome the recent decision of the Supreme Court to turn down the request from the killers of Jerry McCabe to be freed. I also appreciate the efforts of the Garda in attempting to tidy up a difficult situation in Limerick recently. I am thankful for the resources provided to try to achieve that laudable objective. Several incidents in the Limerick area have not been good for the area's image, on top of which we had the tragedy of a bouncer who stood up to drug dealers losing his life. His son, Aaron Fitzgerald, is four years old. Losing a father at that early age brings home to us forcefully the power of crime and drugs.

The Minister was Attorney General for five years. He was, therefore, at the coalface and could see what his predecessor, now Minister for Arts, Sport and Tourism, Deputy O'Donoghue, was doing regarding crime. If Deputy O'Donoghue is to be remembered for anything, he will be remembered for his famous buzzwords at election time of zero tolerance. If one studies the figures for the last few years, one will realise that despite the consistent use of the "zero tolerance" mantra, that mantra was deceitful. Reality is expressed in the figures.

I welcome the Minister producing provisional statistics for 2002. One difficulty in discussing this issue at any time is that we always seem to be using historical data going back over 18 months; the report we received recently details crime statistics for 2001. It is worth comparing the statistics for 2001 with those for 2002. I do not know what the Taoiseach meant when he said at the Ard Fheis of 2002, "We promise to cut crime by getting tough on criminals. We have done just that." If one looks at the figures for 2001 and 2002, they tell a completely different story. In 2001 we had 86,621 recorded headline offences; as the Minister said, this figure is now up 22% to 105,841. Surely that is an indictment of our approach to crime. It is worth nothing what "headline offences" are, as not many may know what they means: they include homicide, assault, sexual offences, arson, drug offences, larceny, robbery and fraud. These are not trivial offences.