I move amendment No. 1:
In page 2, line 12, to delete "1983" and substitute "1981".
The amendment is designed to give effect to the concern of all parties in the House to secure that this concept of military custody is terminated at the earliest possible date. Many of us have great sympathy with the Minister in his efforts to combat crime in the community and to deal with the difficulties arising therefrom. We regretted, therefore, having to deal with a request for yet another three-year extension. Since 1972 we have had two requests for an extension of these powers. We were disturbed by the Minister's reference in his opening speech indicating that at the end of the three years he was not optimistic about his capacity to end military custody. I detected that impression from the Minister although the Minister is correcting me by a shake of his head and I accept that.
We want to allow the briefest possible period within which the Minister will be able to give concrete evidence to the House that there is a real and determined attempt, as opposed to a verbal onslaught, on the concept of military custody. That would then allow us to look with more sympathy on and give more co-operation to a request by the Government to facilitate such legislation for a brief period. It is argued that 12 months is adequate to give reality to that hope. If at the end of that period the Minister is able to say that progress was made over the previous 12 months and he was making a final request for an extension of the powers in this Bill I do not think too many loud voices would be raised. The Minister, and other Members who have spoken on this Bill since 1972, are on record as having stated that they do not want military custody. It is there. The Minister in his opening address gave strong voice to his innermost conviction that such a concept should not be retained. However, the reality is that for better or worse—he mirrored this fear in his own mind—we must wait three years and we do not know what change will take place during that time or who will be the Minister for Justice. The Bill is fundamentally too serious because of its impact on basic concepts of justice to allow such an inordinately long extension.
Accordingly, I would ask the Minister to accept our amendment which in 12 months' time would allow us look at the situation anew, at which time I would hope also, as I am sure would the Minister, that there would be sufficient evidence available to Deputies enabling them to say: at least we are on the eve of getting rid once and for all of a concept of imprisonment and incarceration, fundamentally repugnant to the beliefs of many people in this House and which should be necessary only in times of major civil or military disorder and not be extended beyond the minimum period necessary. I make this request particularly because this Bill was introduced initially primarily, if not almost exclusively, because of an accommodation problem subsequent to the riot in Mountjoy in 1972. Since then it has been twisted, turned and used for various purposes. We are now sliding into psychological acceptance of the view that the Bill is a way of keeping difficult prisoners out of our other prisons, that we are not in a position at present to institute the right kind of systems or sufficiently ahead in developing a high security prison to deal with such difficult and incorrigible people within our system. If concrete evidence to support the Minister's commitment were available in the 12 months to which I refer, then it would be possible for us all to say: in those circumstances we are able now to accept finally that this concept will be removed from our justice system once and for all. This amendment might be the very prod necessary to us all to see the back of this measure, a measure which I fervently believe nobody in this House wants.
