I, too, welcome the new uniform that has been issued to certain limited sections of the Garda Síochána and, like Deputy Morrissey, I trust there will be expedition in the supply of these uniforms to the force in general. I would direct the Minister's attention to the Garda officers normally on duty within the precincts and within the environs of Leinster House. I feel there is a special case for giving priority to them in the supply of this uniform. Leinster House is a centre of attraction for tourists and it would be an improvement to the general tone of the place if the Garda officers on duty were issued with the new uniform.
Can the Minister give us any indication as to what the results were, if any, of the inter-departmental committee set up to investigate the position of the Garda Síochána in general? Has there been any resolution of the problem of what is the ideal type of future Garda force? We hear a good deal of criticism with regard to the supervision of the City of Dublin and I would like to urge once more upon the Minister the desirability of an increase in the mobility of the force together with an amelioration of the conditions under which the men have to do night duty. I have advocated before that a mobile canteen would be a very useful addition to the depot transport of the Garda authorities so that the patrol men could procure at reasonable intervals some hot coffee and sandwiches. That would, in turn, enable them to check at a central point.
I think we are inclined to direct our criticism against the force without adverting fully to the necessity for a more highly mechanised type of efficiency as distinct from purely personnel efficiency. The increase in larceny and housebreaking must occasion alarm. I think the most effective way to combat that would be by having an efficiently mobile striking force with the patrol screen outside it. The more highly mechanised the Guards become the more likely we are to arrest these occurrences at the locus in quo or its immediate vicinity.
I am worried about the housing situation in relation to the Gardaí. I am also worried about the pensions of certain retired members of the force and, in particular, about the allowances to the widows of some of the deceased members. I have raised this matter before. I am not raising it now in a spirit of controversy or with a desire to embarrass the Minister in any way. I am raising it merely in order to keep it on record and to reiterate the appeal that we must make on behalf of these people.
On the question of housing for Gardaí, I think the time has now come for the Minister to set about having, in a district where you have a sergeant and three members of the force, at least one house available within his own control. We do know that many transfers have taken place in the case of married men, leaving single men untransferred. These transfers impose a considerable hardship on those people. One hardship which we seem inclined to neglect, arises from the initial transfer. That causes inconvenience, because in many cases, when a married man is transferred, his children may be at what one may describe as the half-educated stage. Those with experience in the education of children know that it is not exactly the best thing to have a break in a child's life when it has reached a certain stage of education. It will have settled down to the ways of a school over perhaps a period of four or five years, and so if a married Garda is transferred it may take some time before the children will readily settle down in a different school. I know the Minister can tell me that is the man's own affair, that the Commissioner may readily tell him that, too, and that the district justice may tell him that, but I submit to the Minister that it is a matter of general concern. I think the matter is one on which the Minister must have his own personal outlook and, therefore, I would suggest to him that it would be well if he were to examine it again and try to reduce to the absolute minimum the transfer of married men with families, particularly in cases where the educational problem arises.
There are other facets of the Vote which I want to deal with. I want to know from the Minister what progress, if any, has been made in regard to the inevitable hardy annual problem—the Land Registry—and what progress, if any, has been made in connection with the Circuit Court clerks. We had a fairly comprehensive advance made on behalf of the District Court clerks. I am sure they will be pleased to hear from the Minister of the abolition of certain part-time posts and that the number of established District Court clerks is on the increase. I am glad to see that, because one of the posts that had to suffer the fate of abolition happened to be in my area. I feel that the contumely which I might have suffered as a Deputy for not being over-vociferous in ensuring its continuance has been justified by the fact that a permanent and pensionable post will become available at some future time as a result of these amalgamations, which were long overdue. I feel the time has now come to deal with the next type of clerks. The Parliamentary Secretary to the Government, who has come in, will, I imagine, have something to say on that aspect of the question because he has a more intimate and more personal knowledge of the matter than I have. I would ask the Minister to put what pressure he can on the Department to ameliorate the many grievances which those people are suffering from.
In general, I think we are entitled to say "well done" to the Minister's Department. There have been many improvements effected, from our point of view as lawyers, in various aspects of the administration. We are glad to see that. With Deputy Morrissey I should like to revert for a moment to the question of the recruitment of 300 Gardaí. I am completely opposed to Deputy Gallagher's view. I think that nearly the worst thing that could happen to a young Guard is that he should be sent from the depot to a Dublin station. I do not think that is the best way to initiate those Guards into a knowledge of their general duties, nor do I think it would produce the most desirable consequences. I think that most of them want a little bit of experience, and I happen to know that a good many of them might, in the main, be very anxious not to get a city assignment at the moment.
I might ask the Minister, apropos of that, if he thinks there will ever be a solution of the vexed problem that arises in connection with Gardaí stations in the city. The Minister must know perfectly well—we know perfectly well—that the impact of the cost of living and the difficulty that arises in connection with various types of accommodation, is felt in a more exaggerated way in these city stations than it would, say, in the normal rural district. I wonder if there is any way of resolving that problem, and whether there might not be some special allowance made to the Gardaí in the metropolitan area to enable them to overcome these particular hardships?
I feel that many of the multitudinous duties which are imposed on the Gardaí throughout the country should be scrapped. I would be inclined to go even further than Deputy Morrissey did in this matter. I think the time has come for the Minister to retire, as quickly as he possibly can, within his own field. These Guards are being used as a kind of spare-time filing clerks, for the filling of forms for various Departments, and for the carrying out of various types of investigations. A great deal of their time is taken up in the filling and completing of forms. Now that rationing and its implications are, apparently, to go, I think the time has come for the Minister to get this type of archaic form-filling out of the way in the Garda stations throughout the country. I think he should also try and get rid, as soon as possible, of the accoutrementa and documenta, except those which are immediately relevant to his own Department, which adorn these places, thereby making more time available to the Gardaí to perform their normal duties, as distinct from being worried with filling forms and answering letters from X Departments.
I am not inclined to agree with what Deputy Hickey said about motorists. The main difficulty that is facing us to-day in connection with road traffic is not the much maligned motorist. The much maligned motorist has not got a snowball's chance in Hell if anything happens. There can be no doubt about that if one bears in mind the chaotic conditions which obtain so far as traffic in this city is concerned. If one wants to inform himself on that he has only to be around O'Connell Bridge at 5 o'clock in the evening and see what the conditions are there—a great congregation of motorists, cyclists and pedestrians. In my view, the cyclist has become the real traffic menace in Dublin. There is a normal regulation which says that only two can cycle abreast. In certain circumstances three may cycle abreast, but in traffic it was never meant that more than two should travel abreast. Certain very worthy film excerpts have been issued by the Department of Local Government calling on all to "make the road safe". If you are driving a car and you happen to stop at Grafton Street corner or at O'Connell Bridge you will see anything from seven to 12 cyclists cross your bows. That is bad enough but when they start dodging in and out between the tiny little spaces which there may be between cars, then woe betide the driver of a car if he happens to touch one of them. I am not inclined to agree with going for the motorist where the motorist has been wrong. He, in the main, has suffered the consequences. I do not for one moment condone excessive speed in traffic. I do not for one moment condone any of the crimes that go with alcoholism in motor driving but I do think that the problem in the City of Dublin will have to be tackled to ensure that cyclists keep within a reasonable distance of the side of the road and not go joy-riding in and out of the traffic or form like a cohort or a phalanx across the road when traffic starts off. That is a facet of Dublin traffic that I would earnestly direct the Minister's attention to.
What are we going to do with certain pedestrians in Dublin who, with a pedestrian crossing on their right and left, will insist on crossing the road in different directions trying to catch up with some pal who is shopping or trying to shout some observation at someone else? What you are going to do with that type of pedestrian I do not know. In connection with the motor accident problem and a good deal of the traffic problem in Dublin, a fair amount of attention will have to be directed to the cyclists and pedestrians. I think the same is true, in the main, of Cork City. It is a three-fold problem and all the blame does not rest on the shoulders of the motorists. I earnestly urge the Minister to give some consideration to the production of regulations to control cyclist traffic in the City of Dublin. With a reasonable amount of control, I think the main difficulties in regard to congestion in traffic control will resolve themselves.
With other Deputies, I would like to pay a very sincere tribute to the point duty men of both Dublin and Cork. Patience and tact seem to be theirs in an inexhaustible supply. They meet with all kinds of difficulties, and I think it would be unworthy of us, on an occasion such as this, not to pay tribute to that courtesy and tact. Point duty is a type of avocation within the Guards itself that a person has virtually to have a vocation for in order to be successful.
Like Deputy Morrissey, I should like to urge the Minister to ask the Commissioner—it is primarily the Commissioner's function—to review the tour of duty of people on point duty, partiticularly in inclement weather during the winter and early spring. I think there has been considerable improvement in that direction up to now, but I would urge the Minister to have any further improvement that is necessary carried out as quickly as possible.
I think that the problem of school attendance is taken a little bit too lightly by everybody. Apropos of what Deputy Morrissey said, in the main, prosecution for non-attendance in relation to school children comes not on the first serious lapse or even on the second. It comes when there is an indication of a general disregard for school attendance not in the main by the child. The main responsibility in this instance must ultimately revert to the parents and that is where the root of this problem must inevitably lie. The Minister should urge upon his colleague, the Minister for Education, the speedy erection of adequate schools in very heavily populated areas. Some of the schools in these populated areas have infinitely too many children attending them and it is not possible to check rolls and check attendances efficiently. It is that type of overcrowding that inevitably leads to this loose system by which the children can either successfully "mitch"—maybe some of us mitched in our youth—or avoid attending school at all.
That is something which should cause us apprehension. Having regard to the limited opportunities and, in many cases, the possibility of ultimate emigration from this country, I think the least we can ensure is that the rudiments of education are the heritage of every Irish child in this new, free Republic of ours. It is a difficult problem to deal with and I am sure it is one that has given the Minister's Department a good deal of worry and distress.
It is easy for us to advert to it. I frankly admit to the Minister that it is not too easy to suggest a solution. You have the instance where the parents are both working and where it is necessary for the maintenance of a big family that both the mother and father have to earn. In that case, while one may criticise the parents, one must have a ready sympathy for the difficulties that exist. It is a problem that calls for the co-operation of all sections of the community and particularly of the clergymen of all religious denominations. It is something that must be tackled now. It is a growth that has shown its head and it is something which, if not stopped in the beginning, may be infinitely more difficult to stop in later years. I urge upon the Minister to use every means in his power to deal with the matter. Indeed, he may come to us to look for such other powers as he may feel are warranted to ensure the cessation of this tendency.
I sincerely hope that, with the output of new personnel from the depot, there will be an increase in crime detection and, as an inevitable consequence of that, a gradual decrease in indictable crime. We would seriously say to the Minister that, where he has single personnel for too long a time stationed in certain areas, it might be well to advise the Commissioner in the interests of the Garda force itself as well as in the interests of the general detection of crime to do a bit of switching around. I do not think there is anything as likely to impair the efficiency of a single member of the force as what I would call overfamiliarity with his particular district.
I wish the Minister luck in his efforts to check indictable crime. I wish him every success possible in the efforts to eradicate the growing increase in non-attendance at school. Generally, I wish to say that we are appreciative within the courts of the efforts of the Minister himself and of his immediate predecessors in the amelioration of some of the worst problems that arose there. May I conclude by again making a plea to resolve as rapidly as possible the problems of the Circuit Court clerks?