Ivana Bacik (Independent)

I gave a full response when I was Deputy Leader last week and I certainly do not intend to give a response today because that has been done.

I am calling for a debate in the new year on the reports that have been published by the Catholic Church's own internal body, the National Board for Safeguarding Children, on a number of dioceses and child protection policies in those dioceses. Some of the findings are encouraging and demonstrate great improvement in practice but equally there are some that are very worrying about the dreadful and appalling recent failure by the church and its authorities in particular dioceses to protect children in those areas. We must debate that in light of the reports from within the church but also in light of the other reports that have been published over time about different failures in the church.

We also need to look at failures by the State in terms of inadequacies in State protections. Important steps were taken by the Joint Committee on Justice, Defence and Equality which looked at the new legislation on withholding information to create a regime of mandatory reporting of child abuse. That was very welcome and we heard from a number of organisations, as we heard from organisations on the vetting Bill. It would be useful for this House to debate this in the new year to look at the panoply of legislative measures promised or in train by then. Not only have the heads of the vetting bureau Bill been published and comments made by the Joint Committee on Justice, Defence and Equality, we have made useful recommendations on foot of submissions made, will now do the same about withholding information and then see the Children First guidelines put on a statutory footing. All of this is in train and it is welcome the Department of Justice and Equality and the Department of Children and Youth Affairs have moved so swiftly on this. It would be useful in this House to review what has been done in light of the reports.

I also call for a debate on community policing. We had the Garda Commissioner before the Joint Committee on Justice, Defence and Equality this morning to speak about community policing. Some of what he said was extremely informative, particularly on the closure of Garda stations in rural areas and other matters. He gave an interesting response to a question I asked about February 2012 and the retirements at senior level and their effect on front-line policing services. It would be a useful debate for us to have in the House.