Eugene Murphy (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I want to return to the issue of crime against our older people. I am sorry I have to raise this today. Let me at the outset say we are not here to frighten people but we have to deal with the facts. I am just quoting from a piece from today's edition of the Irish Independentabout the most recent attack in Kildare:

The incident in Kildare happened at around 9.30 p.m. on Tuesday night when the three-man gang broke into the homeowner’s shed.

He was alerted to the break-in by the sound of his dog barking and was attacked when he confronted them.

It’s understood his wife locked herself into their home for her safety and alerted emergency services.

The Garda is saying that there is an increase in such attacks and that these roaming gangs that did so much damage before are back on the beat. I have confidence in the Garda tackling these gangs again. I know the Minister is concerned about this as we all are. As Oireachtas Members, we all have a job to do. The definition of a civil rights violation is any offence that occurs as a result of the use of force or the threat of force against the victim by the offender. I am sure Senator Ward and others will be able to speak far better about that than I can. We have to stop those attacks. People are frightened.

Even in my own county which is one of the safest counties in the country as per a survey from the Irish Examinerlast year, there is a notable frequency of those attacks where a back or side window of a house has been broken and even when older people are sitting down having their tea, their houses are being ransacked. It has to stop. We all have a responsibility here. We cannot allow this to go on. We have a huge duty not just to talk about it.

I urge all community groups to be on alert. They must work within the law. I am not talking about vigilantism here. They must contact the Garda. We have a duty to drive around our areas in the evening time. This is happening at six, seven or eight o'clock in the evening, not late at night or early in the morning. I do not want to lecture people because politicians seen to be lecturing people nowadays get into bother. For God's sake, though, if we are out for the evening in a restaurant of whatever can we stop putting it up on social media? It is letting people know that the house is vacant or whatever. It is not a good thing to be doing.