Barry Ward (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

It is important to remember that this Bill reacts to the jurisprudential framework that has been put in place. In fact, it puts in place greater safeguards for the citizens. I am very much in favour of a framework that is put in place to prevent the mass surveillance of citizenry. I do not hold with that at all. As I said during our Second Stage debate, this country has a very reasonable approach to data protection albeit it one that comes from Europe but we have taken it on board and I think that we behave very well with it. The notion that we would now turnaround and remove the word "preventing", in the context of preventing crime, from the legislation, to my mind, is a totally unwarranted tying of Garda hands or at least the tying of one hand behind the back, which is unnecessary. The safeguards the Minister has already spoken about, in terms of applications having to be made, are already in the Bill. I am concerned about the tenor of these amendments and I hope the Senators understand what I mean.The starting point is an attitude that we must stop any action by the Garda in respect of data to prevent crime. If it can use data to prevent crime, so be it; that does not necessarily mean that the Garda is offending against the presumption of innocence. If the presumption of innocence was taken to its logical conclusion, the Garda would never robustly question or arrest a suspect or apply to deny that person bail because that offends against the presumption of innocence. There are other areas of law, particularly the Bail Act 1997, which allow the courts or An Garda Síochána in certain circumstances to take a particular view in respect of someone but it must be evidence-based. Even in respect of the proposed substituted section 6(1)(b), it does not mean the Garda can just pick someone, decide it does not like them and therefore anticipate that this person is going to commit a crime and, in a preventative fashion, gather data on that person. In all the circumstances of what is provided for in the Bill, that would be totally illegal. In fairness to An Garda Síochána, it does not have unlimited resources any more than any aspect of the State. It is not going to spend time gathering data in a preventative fashion on somebody when there is no basis to suspect that he or she might be likely to commit an offence.

It is entirely proportionate, in my view, that An Garda Síochána would be empowered to take steps it can take to prevent crime. To do otherwise, would be madness. We would be tying the garda's hands behind his or her back and doing society in general a disservice, all in the name of potentially cutting off possible breaches of the general data protection regulation, GDPR, when that is already there and built into the Act. I would not want to go too far in suggesting that we should not be trying to prevent crime, for example. We should of course be doing that. Insofar as the Bill can be used in that regard, it should be.