Rose Conway Walsh (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Did Deputies Varadkar or Donohoe, who both served as Ministers in the Department of Transport, Tourism and Sport in 2014, not think the issue was serious enough to report to the Minister for Justice and Equality, as the Minister in charge of policing? Obviously the Garda Commissioner was informed of these discrepancies. I hate even calling them discrepancies because I think it somehow lessens the importance of them. Did the Minister for Justice and Equality not ask the Garda Commissioner why it took her more than a year to notify the Minister? Obviously the Minister has regular briefings with the Commissioner of An Garda Síochána. Can she understand why people will find it difficult to believe that not once during a period of 13 months did the Garda Commissioner mention the suspected illegal activities? Does the Minister think that is acceptable? What is it to say that right now there are other discrepancies, activities or whatever one may wish to call them happening in the Garda Síochána that are being kept hidden from the Minister? Is the Minister concerned about this?

How many other disturbing or disgusting incidents are going to happen and how many more times will the Minister have to come to this Chamber to defend the indefensible? When exactly did the Minister notify the Policing Authority of the discrepancies? When exactly did the Minister notify the Taoiseach of the discrepancies? Will the Minister outline the remedial actions she plans to put in place to compensate the 14,700 people who were incorrectly convicted? I appreciate the Minister has outlined some of those in her statement. In the past few days, we have learned of the devastating effects these convictions had on individuals and families? What is the Minister's timeline for righting these wrongs? Should these letters start going out on 3 April 2017?

Senator Conway refers to the Policing Authority and rightly so, and that we should not politicise this issue because we are in new politics. The statement from the Policing Authority states that it has not yet been provided with the full internal reports from An Garda Síochána into the current issues. Despite questioning over several months, the authority has not been provided with the full internal reports or indeed a clear sense of how these matters have been handled in the Garda Síochána or the status and content of the audits which have been undertaken. It is very clear there is still a lack of transparency, that there are still attempts to stop the Policing Authority doing the job it was put there to do, albeit that the Policing Authority was informed very late in the day. We would have to say that the more things change, the more they stay the same.

We have had to endure scandal after scandal in respect of the Garda Síochána in recent years. The Minister for Justice and Equality congratulates herself and the Fine Gael Party in government for all the progress she has made. That really frightens me because it begs the question of what type of police force did we have under Fianna Fáil in government if the Minister has had to implement all of these measures. Can the Minister now commit to bringing forward emergency legislation to strengthen the power of the Garda Inspectorate, GSOC and the Policing Authority?

It is not only the reputation of An Garda Síochána that has been rocked to the core, but I am afraid the reputation of the Minister has been shattered by this and recent revelations. For the sake of the future of policing and justice is it not time the Minister listened to the people and used her authority to change the leadership of the Garda Síochána? I know for absolute certainty as sure as I am standing here today that the Minister for Justice and Equality will be in this House again before very long and we will be discussing yet another debacle, illegal activity, disgusting and disturbing activity, whatever she wants to call it.