The definition of an officer of Customs and Excise seems to my relatively inexperienced eye— I suppose I will have to stop claiming to be inexperienced fairly shortly; it does not work after a while — includes a member of the Garda Síochána and any person in the public service who is for the time being employed in the prevention of the illegal importation or exportation of goods. Can the Minister tell me if that is a standard definition? Is it taken from previous legislation and, if so, what legislation? If not, what is the basis on which it was arrived at?
Death of Former Oireachtas Member. - Customs and Excise (Miscellaneous Provisions) (No. 2) Bill, 1987: Committee Stage.
Question proposed: "That section 1 stand part of the Bill."
I, too, would welcome clarification from the Minister at this point. It is extremely important that we should know precisely what is involved here because very wide-ranging powers are given in this Bill, indeed, for an important reason. It is all the more important and significant that we who are debating this legislation should have a clear and explicit definition from the Minister as to what precisely is involved in section 1.
I am utterly confused about the machinations from one Bill to the other. There are different powers in the 1976 Act from those in the 1956 Act and in the 1977 Act from the 1984 Act. I am particularly aware that the Garda have specific powers under the 1984 Act which are not available to customs officers. Does this Bill give additional powers to the Garda or does it give the same powers to the other named groups as the Garda have at the moment under the 1984 Act? We need to be specific on this before we go any further.
First, in reply to Senator Ryan the definition of an officer of the Customs and Excise is the same as that in section 1 of the Customs Act, 1956. The definition covers the references to officers of Customs and Excise in the various sections of that Act.
Senator Bulbulia spoke about clarification. The main purpose of the Bill is to provide additional powers for the staff of Customs and Excise in parts of the country where they operate and in the role they play, with particular emphasis on combating drug smuggling into this country. That is the main purpose of the Bill. I want to assure the House that there are no draconian measures being given to the officers of the Customs and Excise. We have had very vigilant membership of the Customs and Excise over the years. The Government and I are confident that the powers being transferred are reasonable and are urgently needed in order to combat drugs coming into this country and the drug epidemic that can destroy our beautiful country and our wonderful people. I assure the House that the Bill has been very carefully and meticulously put together and basically embodies various sections and parts of other existing law, be they Customs and Excise, Finance Bills or other legislation and enshrines them in one Bill giving these powers to the Customs and Excise officers so that, together along with the Garda, they can play their full role in combating the importation of drugs or any prohibited goods.
I want to assure Senator O'Toole that no additional powers are being given to the Garda. They already have special powers to deal with this matter. We want to ensure that the Garda are one arm of the State and the Customs and Excise are another. The Customs and Excise are in a very invidious position in that they can detect certain matters but, as the law stands, they cannot do anything about them. The purpose of this Bill is to get rid of these anomalies.
I understand the Minister's concern. I agree completely that the Customs and Excise officers need support in this area. A difficulty arises from what the Minister has just said. The Garda have particular powers under the 1984 Act and various other Acts. Those powers are subject to various checks and balances, by complaints commissions and so on. There are ways in which the Garda are required to be answerable for the powers they have.
What concerns me is that we are giving people new powers which they did not have before and which the Minister quite rightly said they may well need. When they suspect drug carriers they must have some powers to move in on them. Would the Minister not admit that this Bill, and this section in particular, does not contain any measure which will balance that extra power with responsibility or accountability. This is precisely the point I would like the Minister to respond to.
In his reply the Minister gave us the broad thrust of the Bill. Certainly I have no quarrel with that and I feel very strongly that drugs, and their importation, are an unmitigated menace and that in this State we must take every conceivable measure we can to guard against the importation of drugs. I broadly welcome this Bill as did all the other Senators who contributed on Second Stage.
Senator O'Toole spoke about guarding against abuse and said he wishes to see some system of checks and balances in place. These are areas which concern me. In giving these extra powers to the Customs and Excise officers perhaps the Minister will say what training there will be for the Customs and Excise officers in the use of these powers. It is important that, when such wide-ranging powers are being given to people, they should be very carefully detailed and explained to them and that possible situations can be foreseen and can be discussed so that the people can be trained and equipped to deal with them. I am slightly concerned about this matter because when the Minister for Finance spoke at the conclusion of Second Stage, he indicated that this measure would not involve additional finance and would not be a burden on the Exchequer. I feel strongly that proper training must be provided because we are giving very wide-ranging powers and I cannot see how that can be done without incurring additional expenditure. I also share the concerns expressed by Senator O'Toole.
As far as the Minister for Finance and I are concerned, there will be no additional cost to the State as a result of the implementation of this Bill. I accept fully that there are checks and balances vis-á-vis the powers given to the Garda Síochána but under the 1984 Act they have total responsibility for the enlargement of law throughout all this island. This is a different type of Bill in that it is specific. It deals with the Customs and Excise people who operate in particular parts of the country. They are not operating right across the country. They operate in specified areas and the laws under which they operate are basically effective in specified areas. Some sections of this Bill acknowledge that fact.
I do not think we have to worry about abuse because the Customs and Excise people already have very extensive powers of search. This Bill proposes to extend those powers to cater for actual commodities, articles, or prohibited goods coming into our State. We want to enshrine in law by name, by act and by deed, an opportunity for the Customs and Excise officers to deal with the menace of these goods coming into our country at particular points of entry, whether it be sea ports, airports, land frontiers or whatever. We want to ensure that there will be no anomaly between the powers of the Garda vis-á-vis the job they do right across the country and the job done by Customs and Excise people at specific points of our country, and they can do the job together in the best interests of all the people. I want to tell the House and Senator Bulbulia that I have been assured that sufficient training will be made available under the direction of the Revenue Commissioners with the cooperation of the Department of Finance for the officers of the Customs and Excise who will be operating the new Act when it becomes law. I assure the House also that Customs and Excise themselves, the Department of Finance and the Revenue Commissioners are constantly aware of the necessity to upgrade the methods of detection and the need for modern technology.
They have constant training and retraining and have acquired the necessary facilities to enable them to discharge their duties in the best interests of the State. I assure the House that that is the type of system that will continue whether or not this Bill is passed. I am confident that the House will pass it. That is the type of policy that will continue in the Revenue Commissioners Office and the Department.
Is the Minister saying there is a budget in existence for training and that this budget is sufficient to cover the additional training or the upgrading of existing training which will be required by virtue of this Bill?
Yes. In the budget for the Department of Finance there is a subhead under which there is an allocation each year for training. I had to answer some questions in the Dáil on that in the last session. Under that section there are necessary resources to ensure that there is training, retraining, adaptation and availability of information and updating of information available to the staff of Customs and Excise. From that subhead money will be made available when and if necessary.
At the outset of the discussion on this Bill we should at least be honest with each other. I am not sure whether the Minister is aware that if you take the land frontier of this country and the extent of it, and when you consider the fact that there are 52 different airstrips and various ports around the periphery of the country, the areas where these powers would not extend are very small indeed. I do not know where we would be talking about. The county of Laois does not touch any county which touches the sea but that would probably be excluded. I asked a simple question at the beginning. Will the powers extended to customs officers under this Bill be subject to any checks, balances, investigation or complaints authority in the same way as the Garda are? I am not trying to catch anybody out. I want that information. I take it from the Minister's answer that there is not. He said it is not widely extensive. I am saying it is widely extensive. If that is the case we can still proceed with the Bill. Things can be built into this Bill which, in the main, can strengthen it, if the Minister is of a mind to do that. I am simply asking the question. We all have the same viewpoint here. Nobody wants to facilitate customs smugglers, drugs smugglers or people who are running——
I do not want to interrupt you but you are on an interpretation of section 1. You have gone nearly ahead of me to section 2.
I am building up to it.
Wait until we get to it and then we will check the build up.
Question put and agreed to.
SECTION 2.
Question proposed: "That section 2 stand part of the Bill."
It is probably due to Senator O'Toole's inexperience that he was talking about section 2 when he was on section 1. We will have to forgive him, I suppose.
My inexperience is the cause of all sorts of problems for me.
I was going to say something but I had better not. I would like the Minister to tell me a bit about section 2 because at the conclusion of Second Stage, the Minister for Finance, Deputy MacSharry, explained to us that there was nothing novel in sections 2 and 3. It was simply an extension of powers Customs and Excise already had to a new area. As I recall it, the Minister explained that this was specifically designed for people who were not necessarily travellers. The Customs and Excise already have all of the powers that exist here to deal with people who are travelling. This is to deal with people who are — to use a phrase more appropriate in other contexts — found on or in the vicinity of a land frontier, or a port, or any other place and whom the Customs and Excise suspect. That is the understanding of it. That does not get away from the fact that the powers referred to here are considerable.
The first question I should like to ask the Minister is: where do these powers reside? In what Act do these powers currently reside that are now being extended by this Bill? Is it the 1956 Customs Act or where is it? That is the first issue. I would like to talk a little more about a number of things I will mention them now. Is he not worried that, apart from civil libertarian considerations about powers like those contained in section 2, the absence of legislatively based protections for the suspect in the form of a complaints procedure, in the form of regulations about how people are to be treated when they are in custody or, indeed, regulations about searching means that customs officers are liable to be the object of considerable misuse by people and perhaps litigation. In other words, people will complain that they were improperly treated, improperly dealt with, etc. I do not think it is proper or right for the citizen or for officers of the Customs and Excise to have powers like this without building in the sort of checks which ensure that the citizen cannot be abused and a citizen cannot accuse an officer of abusing powers in a way which can lead to damage in either direction.
Can I ask specifically under subsection (1), paragraph (i) page 4, if the search of any person involves strip searching for instance? Where is there a guarantee which is contained in the Garda Regulations that a person will never be searched by a person of the opposite sex. That is contained in the regulations about how gardaí conduct searches under the Criminal Justice Act, 1984. It is extremely important in the interests of both suspects and Customs and Excise officers that such a search should be carried out by a person of the same sex as the person being searched. If the question of strip searching arises — I can understand why it might in the area of drug smuggling — what procedures, regulations, checks and balances are contained? I do not think anybody believes there should be an indiscriminate power to demand strip searches and, if such is to be done, it should be conducted under very well regulated conditions.
Related to that is the rather peculiar power under subsection (2) that if an officer decides to search a person under this section, he may require the person to accompany him to a customs office.
The officer of Customs and Excise could, at least in theory, insist on searching somebody in public. I do not think that serves the objectives of the Bill or the interests of Customs and Excise officers, apart altogether from the suspect or the citizen. When the power is there to require somebody I think the person "shall" require a person to accompany him. Any citizen is entitled to feel that if he or she is under suspicion they will be searched in private. I do not think it is a matter that should be conducted in public.
They are a number of things that I will be concerned about. The underlying concern I have is: where do these powers originate and in what legislation did they start? Why is it that these powers can be given to one agency of the State and cannot be given to any other? The Garda, who have a far more difficult task in which their lives are at risk in the defence of the security of the State, have got to be far more circumspect about how they use powers of search and arrest than Customs and Excise. I would hate if we got to the stage of believing that, because we are dealing with Customs and Excise, powers in excess of those given to the Garda to deal with subversion, for instance, should be made available to them. The problem is that this is a replication of earlier legislation and the earlier legislation was drafted at a time when, perhaps, some of these issues were not as widely talked about. What we have now is a reproduction of something that is 30 or 40 years old — it may be even older — without thought and without reference. It is time that the same accountability was introduced when we are extending the power that has already been introduced for the Garda.
It is very important that the Minister should be able to give firm re-assurances on this section of the Bill. I am unhappy about some of the language used in the Bill. It confers huge discretionary powers on Customs and Excise people. While I voice that criticism I again want to restate the fact that I admire what Customs and Excise people do. Their purpose is a valid one. They are involved in protecting the institutions of the State and my criticisms of this section of the Bill are in no way intended to undermine the legitimate functions of Customs and Excise people. A phrase such as "in the vicinity of any port or airport", for instance, is one that needs to be tied down. What is meant precisely by "in the vicinity of any port or airport"? Do we have a radius of a particular mileage?
No part of Ireland is too far from the vicinity of a port or an airport. If you really want to stretch it, you can say that. I understood that in relation to the Border the radius is 20 miles. Perhaps the Minister would like to confirm that that is so. It would be a very good idea if, in this section, we could firm up on precisely what we mean by the phrase "in the vicinity of any port or an airport". There is also a reference to "an officer of Customs and Excise who with reasonable cause suspects that a person...".
What is "reasonable cause"? I can imagine that "reasonable cause" would be where there was a tip-off from another agency that a person was quite likely to be carrying drugs. That is something I can understand. But could it be interpreted that "reasonable cause" meant somebody who was bearded, had a knapsack was sandalled and looked generally like what was fashionable in the sixties — one of the flower power people — and who seemed like somebody who might be engaged in drug smuggling. That would leave an individual like that or, indeed, a person of colour open to a particular prejudice of an individual Customs and Excise officer. I would be deeply unhappy if a phrase such as "who with reasonable cause suspects" could be used in the broadest possible context and could as a result undermine the civil liberties of individuals within this State.
Who will supervise Customs and Excise people in the discharge of the functions which we propose to give them in this legislation? Who is in charge? Where does the buck stop given that there is in place a Garda Complaints Tribunal and that this legislation does not envisage any such body to keep the checks and balances right in relation to this legislation? I would like re-assurances from the Minister that some body of that nature will be put in position; otherwise I think there is a possibility of abuse. While we are debating this legislation we should bear firmly in mind a wish not to see any abuse of power.
The whole area of search of the person is one that concerns me. I was interested to hear some Senators in their Second Stage contributions make reference to the possibility of an X-ray of the individual. The Minister in his reply to Second Stage ruled out the possibility of X-ray. I am glad about that because I could envisage a situation where a pregnant woman, for example, could be the subject of an X-ray and that would be totally unacceptable. It is an invasion of the person that I would not like to see being employed under this section of the Bill. I want to know if doctors will be appointed on stand-by at various ports and airports, or in the catchment area, or within a radius of ports or airports who will be specifically detailed in the same way as they are by the Garda authority in the cases of an infringement of the Intoxicating Liquors Act? Will people be specifically mandated to come in and assist if there is to be a body search of a person who is suspected by customs officers? Will there be statutory instruments accompanying this legislation which will spell out those sort of details? I think there ought to be. I wonder has the Minister considered that.
Reference was also made to the possibility of urine tests. There has been an increase in the degree of sophistication of tests and what they can show up. I wonder is it envisaged that such tests will be carried out on people? If that is the case, and it is not in the legislation, will it be in some sort of accompanying statutory instrument or regulation which will spell out the fine detail of the implementation of this section of the Bill? I would like also specific information about strip searching. In the context of the Second Stage contributions I, and indeed, other Senators made references to the fact that there are people who will inject drugs; these people are called, I think, swallowers. Very often the orifices of the body might need to be examined and I want to know by whom, and where, and under what controls, and what medical personnel will be present? I express also my concern, which has been raised by Senator Brendan Ryan, that it is necessary to state specifically that no member of the opposite sex would be involved in an intimate search of anybody suspected of the importation of drugs. I have rolled a lot of questions into one section of the Bill and I hope the Minister will be able to give me the clarifications and reassurances I seek.
On this section, like a number of fellow Senators, I too expressed some reservations about what I saw as an infringement of civil liberties in the whole thrust of the Bill on Second Stage. In the specific context of this section and listening to Senator Ryan and Senator Bulbulia they seem to be suggesting that there needs to be a further system of checks and balances.
I have a brother-in-law who is in the French customs service and who is responsible, during his career, for apprehending and searching and he has had experience of many of the things discussed on this section. Because of my own concern about the civil liberties aspect, as articulated by colleagues, I was curious to know from his experience whether he felt the suggestions contained in this Bill would be sufficient or adequate in practice. His response was that he was surprised that there was not such legislation in this country, particularly as Ireland is a peripheral region of the EC and, as the completion of the internal market continues apace, will be finding that more and more emphasis will be placed on the Customs and Excise service to detect the more sophisticated drug travellers who are now part and parcel of life. He went on to say he believed that the proposals contained in the Bill did not go far enough; that we should draw on the customs service in France, a member state of the EC for experience. This is just a start down the road towards helping to tighten up an area which obviously is in need of being tightened up.
Senator Bulbulia raised the question, for example, of the alleged prejudice or otherwise customs officers might show, using the phrase "reasonable cause". She went on to say that perhaps a person might look a particular way or their colour might in some way motivate a customs officer to search them. It is happening every day of the week at our airports and our sea ports. People are being stopped because customs officers, in their opinion, have reasonable cause to think they may be importing something illegally.
We have all gone through customs and I would not be human if I did not admit — and I am sure it will strike a chord with other travellers — that sometimes you wonder: are they going to stop me? There is no criterion on which to base this. The criterion is based on the customs officers' own expertise and experience as to whether they will or will not stop people. While I accept the reservations which have been put forward by my colleagues on the other side of the House, I suggest to the Minister that, having regard to our experience of the integrity of our customs officers, we should not concern ourselves too much about whether they will carry out their jobs with honesty and integrity. I see no difficulties with the sections in this Bill at all.
The Select Committee on Crime, Lawlessness and Vandalism recommended that the powers that customs officers had should be extended and that is included in section 2 of the Bill. We must have certain safeguards. The matters raised by Senator Bulbulia on the definitions of "vicinity", and "reasonable cause" are areas on which we must get clear definitions.
In relation to "the search of a person and, if he considers it necessary for that purpose, detain the person for such time as is reasonably necessary for carrying out the search". I would like to ask the Minister if there is any limit to the time a person can be detained under that section. That is very important. A person could be detained for longer than was necessary. When I spoke on this section on Second Stage I asked if the Minister would consider bringing in regulations in the same way as the Minister for Justice brought in regulations with the Criminal Justice Act as it was passing through the Dáil and Seanad. These regulations put many people at ease.
Another point I want to make is in relation to the search of vehicles. It came to the committee's attention that the customs officials had not got the necessary equipment for the searching of vehicles. We touched on this on section 1 but I have to mention it again because it is actually related to section 2. The committee were of the view that covered bays and pits, ramps and hoists should be provided to enable vehicles to be examined. There is to no way a thorough examination can take place of a vehicle unless these facilities are available. I ask the Minister, under the subhead which he has mentioned, if money will be provided to bring into effect the kind of equipment customs officers badly need. Senator Bulbulia will be glad to hear that the committee considered the matter of X-raying people and vehicles as well but, due to the health hazard, did not recommend that.
I want to put on the record that I did not stand up at any point to criticise the extra powers being given to customs officers. In fact, I do not think anybody on this side of the House did in deference to Senator Mooney. People talked about how they would be applied. I would like to have a few points clarified; The first point is quite important. The word "airport" has not been defined anywhere in the Bill. Does the Minister see a difference between an "airport" and an "airstrip"? That is important. There are 52 airstrips in this country. "In the vicinity" of an airstrip, land frontier and posts means the whole country. I know the answer is that an airstrip is an airport for legal purposes in so far as stuff can be brought in. We are, therefore, talking about every part of Ireland.
There are 52 airstrips in the free State. There is a land boundary and there are ports all around it. If you are talking about the vicinity of those airports and those points which I have just mentioned you are talking about the whole country. That is a matter of fact. You can shake your heads if you wish but geography is geography and I cannot do anything to change it. I am just stating a fact. Therefore these powers extend all around the country. I have spoken to customs officers about this and I want to assure the Minister that customs officers, while they welcome many things in this Bill, are also afraid of their lives of it. I want to be crudely practical about this.
In relation to the detention powers given under section 2 of this Bill, what does a customs officer do having detained somebody? How is the search to take place? Having said that I want to refer again to the point about X-rays. Of course I agree and accept completely the damage that an X-ray can do to somebody with a particular illness and also to a person who was pregnant. I agree that such a person should not under any circumstances be subjected to it. However, if the Minister accepts that somebody may be strip searched and have their body cavities and body orifices searched, quite rightly, in my estimation, that is not any more of an intrusion into a person than an X-ray. that is a fact that must be stated. Under the technology available at present, the question has been asked: what is "reasonable cause for detention?" If people are being detained and if they are carrying a package or a packet inside their body, an X-ray will show that up or will show something inside the body and that gives clear grounds for suspicion. Technology has developed and that must be considered if there is to be a detention power under section 2. We must not just look at detention because a detention for a period of 36 hours or whatever does not necessarily mean that something taken in the body will be passed through the body in that period of time. There is a flaw here.
The other area to which I want to refer is that the most sophisticated area of detection of matter inside the body is through urine testing. The technology in this area has gone ahead by leaps and bounds and nowadays the slightest traces of substances within the body can be detected. If somebody is to be detained for a long period, as under the intoxicating liquor legislation, that person can be required to give urine samples. I believe this power should be included in this section. I do not have problems with the powers. I believe they should be somewhat more extensive but the officers should be accountable.
I can tell the Minister things that worry customs officers about the question of detention. Where is the person to be detained? Where will the detention take place? Under what conditions will it take place? If somebody is to be detained for a long period, it should follow also that there should be a maximum period tied into it and that there should be checks during the period of detention. I ask the Minister to clarify that airports are airstrips. I ask the Minister to explain in detail how this legislation will operate if the detained person is not required to subject himself or herself to a medical examination, or X-ray testing, or urine sample testing. I would like to know how it can work.
I know that the Minister's Department are investigating the use of what is known in Europe as the EMIT test, a system of detection of drugs, and I want to know how that could be used under this legislation. How will we see to it that the detained person's rights are protected; that a person is treated fairly; that a person is not subjected to 24 hours continuous interrogation or subject to 24 hours continuous hassle? That should be done.
How are the doctors to be chosen? I agree that there should be panels of doctors available in the same way as they are under the intoxicating liquor laws to give effect to this legislation. These are some of the points that come up directly on this section. I ask the Minister to come clean on this issue, to indicate to me that some of these things will be taken on board in the working of this Bill and to indicate to me how we can be sure the person will be looked after. Does he feel, for instance, that when somebody is held in detention a custodial officer should be responsible for the person's custody.
I would also ask about the checks and balances which have been built into the European legislation, including, indeed, the French legislation, Senator Mooney, and the British legislation, as to how these are applied. I want to know why we disposed of those. We do not want people, on the one hand, to be abused, and we certainly do not want walking free people who are breaking up the system and destroying our young people through the illegal importation of drugs. We must, therefore, find a middle line of application of this legislation when it comes to be implemented. I would ask the Minister for a most detailed response on some of those issues.
Many points have been raised by many contributors. I would nearly want to be a customs officer myself to satisfy some of the questions. I want to assure Senator O'Toole that neither I nor my Department have anything to come clean about. We put a Bill before you——
(Interruptions.)
— that is interesting to the people of this country. Customs officers form the Department that I represent are not on trial in this House but I think it is unfair for us, as Members of the Oireachtas, Members of the Legislature, to cast aspersions on people——
On a point of order, every question I have raised here today I have been asked to raise by customs officers and their responsible organisations. I would ask that that remark be taken back. Nothing I have said in any way impugns the work that those decent, hard-working public servants are doing. I resent very much the implication that there was some criticism of their work. Everything I have said here is quite the opposite — to represent their point of view and to support the work they are doing.
I made a statement in reply to what the Senator said "to come clean", as if I have something to hide. I will make it quite clear that I have nothing to hide. I will give all the information that I have at my disposal. I have gone into this in the most detailed manner, and I am satisfied with the expert officials with whom I have discussed this Bill and, after having further consultations with my senior Minister, I am quite satisfied that the powers which this House will enable to be passed on to the customs officers will be most reasonable and will be discharged in the most reasonable way, as the customs officers have discharged their duties over the years. It is open to any Member of this House, to any Member of any House, to the public themselves, not alone to the Legislature and through the courts, to take any action they wish at any time if they are not satisfied with the operation of the law as passed by these Houses. The only reason I say this to the Senator is that he made an allegation that I had to come clean. I want to say that I do not have to come clean; neither do my Department nor the people I represent. We will give you all the information possible. There is no point in creating a situation whereby the people doing the job on behalf of the State, in detecting, first of all, the breaking of customs law in bringing in illegal goods and prohibited goods into our country, will be put on the same level as those perpetrating or committing the crime. I want to assure the House that there is nothing to complain about and I will do my utmost to answer all the questions that have been raised.
On a point of order, if I may, I am disappointed that the Minister should feel under siege in this House and that he should adopt such a combative attitude.
Everybody who spoke on the Second Stage of this Bill expressed support for the measures contained in it. Those of us on this side of the House who were charged with the examination in detail of every aspect of this legislation are merely doing the job that has been entrusted to them. I, for one, make no apology to anybody for questioning the Minister, for pulling apart the legislation, for teasing out the various ramifications of it. I do it in a spirit of goodwill and the maximum amount of co-operation, reserving to myself and to my party the right to suggest amendment or to oppose or to put forward better ideas. I would ask the Minister to accept that what I say in this is done in a spirit of goodwill and that in no way do I wish to cast aspersions on the customs and excise people or in any way condone the importation of drugs. I have made my views very clear and explicit on that. I would just ask the Minister if we could examine this legislation in a calm, rational and considered manner and not feel that anybody in particular is taking sides on the issue.
I feel Senators should allow the Minister to complete his reply to the other points raised.
I just listened for a few minutes. What I heard and what a Senator in this House said was that it was up to the Minister to come clean. That would suggest to me that the Minister was hiding something and it did impugn the Minister. I also thought I heard said "the Minister and his Department to come clean". I would not consider that to be a fair suggestion to make to any Minister — that he should come clean. I do not think that is right. It did impugn the Minister and also the officials of his Department. I just listened there and I did not like to hear it. There was no suggestion from what I heard that the Minister was trying to hide anything. He explained that he was prepared to reveal anything that was required. So I think it was impugning the Minister and the officials.
The record will show, seeing that I made the comment, if anyone cares to read it when it is written up, that I asked the Minister to come clean on one particular point: why the checks and balances built into — and I spoke directly to Senator Mooney as I said it — the French and the UK legislation was not taken on board by us. I asked, on that particular point, would the Minister come clean on that issue. That is precisely the question that I asked. I would also like to state for the record that I can say without fear of contradiction that I have spent more of my life fighting against drug smuggling and drug abuse than anybody in this House. The idea that I would in any sense facilitate drug smugglers or those people who have made life difficult for customs officers does not stand up on my record and I would like to say that just for the record of this House.
Acting Chairman
I would like Senators to come back to section 2 of the Bill and allow the Minister an opportunity to reply to all the points that have been raised.
I now want to assure the House and the Members here that I have no difficulty in answering any of the questions with the information that I have got or that I will get if necessary. There is no latent motive for this Bill before this House and anybody who suggests otherwise would be misleading the House. I have a duty to reassure the House of the situation. I am delighted to hear of Senator O'Toole's work in combating drugs and I am confident he will be further able to enlarge his contribution in that field as a result of the passing of this Bill.
Senator Ryan asked where do the powers reside. The powers reside basically in the 1977-84 Misuse of Drugs Acts. Many people have made major contributions with regard to the various powers being given to the Customs and Excise. Already, for the past 65 years one could say at this stage, since our State was founded, and indeed prior to that, the Customs and Excise people have had extensive powers. We are operating on Customs and Excise law that is very old and that has stood the test of time, and it has been updated in various ways over the years. This Bill is a co-ordination of many of the Acts, and amendments of parts of them, to ensure that the most modern law will be available to help the Customs and Excise officers to co-operate in the best interests of this State in doing their own job in co-operation with the Garda and in co-operation with international Customs and Excise throughout the world.
As I say, there are extensive powers of search under the various Acts as they stand. Any travellers can be searched without warrant. Customs and Excise people have exercised this power with care and respect over the years and I am confident that they will continue to do so. Under the Customs Act of 1876 a person may require, prior to search, to be brought before a justice or a senior officer of the Customs and Excise who, on listening to and hearing the complaint being made by the Customs and Excise officer, can then determine whether or not there will be a search. That is there under 1876 law, as far back as that.
Taking it a step further people have talked about various methods of search. It is not proposed that there will be any type of strip searching. It is proposed that there should be the normal type of search, the normal type of investigation, the normal type of frisking in order to prove that somebody is carrying contraband or otherwise or to allay suspicion or confirm the exact position. A female will be searched by a female officer; a male will be searched by a male officer. That is standard practice in Customs and Excise operations and that will continue. There will be no need for doctors as there are no proposals to examine the orifices of the body.
We considered the position regarding X-rays and the Minister for Finance confirmed, and I want to reaffirm to the House, that there is no danger of that being done. That, in itself, would be medically dangerous and we are not going down that road. Senator O'Toole mentioned that we have 52 airstrips as well as a sea boundary and a land frontier. I agree completely that the laws of the land should prevail right across the land and, once they are passed, they must operate in any part of the land. There is no doubt that the Customs and Excise officers are assigned to do a job in particular places, but in co-operation with the Garda. When the law is passed they also have to operate in a particular place at any particular time, based on the information available, based on communication from the Garda Síochána or the Revenue Commissioners vis-á-vis a certain thing happening at a certain time or being likely to happen in a certain place. If it meant there had to be a re-allocation of resources in order to accommodate a particular situation, of course the law of the land would prevail and the Customs and Excise could be used. This gives the State much more flexibility in our efforts to combat drugs.
The Senator also questioned the difference between an airstrip and an airport and, as he said, there is no difference. Technically, they are both the same. I think it was Senator Bulbulia who asked what we mean by "in the vicinity of". As far as we are concerned, the vicinity of an airport is the periphery of the airport, which would include a car park and all that area around it. But commonsense must prevail. If a Customs and Excise officer detected somebody leaving a car park at the airport, or leaving the airport without having been detected passing through, there would be nothing to stop him communicating with the Garda Síochána and co-operating with them. If that same person pulled into the car park of an hotel in another part of the city, it would be a matter for the Garda and the Customs and Excise in co-operation to apprehend that person, communicate with that person and investigate the situation. Commonsense will have to prevail and the law will have to be operated as the situation demands.
Senator O'Toole mentioned also that my Department have proposals for and have under consideration the EMIT test. We have, indeed, and we have ordered a machine to make it as easy as possible to detect in a clinical way a urinal situation which would decide positively or negatively whether there were any chemical or drug particles on a person. That would confirm the exact position. We are proceeding down that road and hope to have that in operation soon.
I have to compliment Senator Doyle. He was a member of the Select Committee on Crime, Lawlessness and Vandalism and many of the recommendations of that committee are contained in the Bill. He raised a number of points about the period of detention. I think Senator Bulbulia also raised that point. The period of detention is "for ás long as is necessary". We expect that to be interpreted in a commonsense fashion, for 15 minutes, half-an-hour, one hour, two hours, three hours. Flexibility has to be given to the officers, whether it be the officers on the spot, the senior officers, or whoever decided at any given time that it was necessary to detain people for a particular period. The customs people make up their minds fairly quickly and only detain people for as long as is necessary. While I am not an intelligence officer, or anything like that, we all know that if people are detained for a certain period of time and they are carrying certain substances, objects, commodities, drugs, or whatever, they will eventually decide to either admit they are carrying such a thing, admit they have knowledge of it or, in some cases they drop the objects they have, if they get the opportunity and move away.
That has happened and we are confident that, taking the human reaction into account, taking the ability of the Customs and Excise officers into account and their record, taking the fact that they will be retrained, updated, and that all information will be available to them, this provision will be operated in a very vigilant, careful, honourable and human fashion.
Senator Doyle also raised a point regarding the necessity to provide facilities for proper examination of lorries and whether or not this would be provided under the same subhead. It would not be possible to provide it under the subhead because it would be a matter for my own Department, the Office of Public Works, but we have an ongoing programme of updating all Customs and Excise posts. There is a priority rating whereby those with most traffic are upgraded and updated with the most modern facilities, particularly on the land frontier, and that programme will continue. I am confident that the necessary facilities and resources will be constantly maintained. As Members of the Oireachtas we would be failing in our duty if we were not vigilant in ensuring that those resources will be made available to the Customs and Excise people.
I want to cover all the points. If there is any point I did not cover I will be only too delighted to answer it. Senator Mooney made a very important point. I would like to compliment him on his attitude because we must recognise the key role the Customs and Excise people play. I am delighted to see he has a connection with an international Customs and Excise group, because we have experienced in this country the most wonderful co-operation with the other international services. I am confident that will continue, particularly within the community, and that we will all be able to cooperate in reducing the terrible difficulties created by the misuse of drugs and the illegal importation of drugs.
The main purpose of this Bill is to ensure that this country will not be the victim of those problems, that we will not be used as a base for redistribution, or be a victim of surplus drugs or other objects in any other country that could allow criminals to take them through our frontiers, airports, seaports or whatever and destroy the whole fabric of the society of this island.
I am amazed to hear some of the points made by the Minister, I feel quite englightened by many of the points he made. He has certainly interpreted the Bill in a different way from the way I had been looking at it. One thing he did not make clear in his reply — and he might come back on it — is the question of the use or application of urine testing. Under this legislation, can a detained person be required to give a urine sample? If that is not the case, how can we use the new system? That was my only point in raising it. My view is that if we are going to use the EMIT system of testing, which has proven to be so successful in other countries, we need an explanation of how we can use it under this legislation.
I would go much further in terms of the powers given in this Bill then the Minister. He mentioned hotel car parks. That is the classic case. There have been more "busts" in hotel car parks than anywhere else in this area. It has always been the case that under the 1984 legislation the customs officers had to call in the Garda and, therefore, there was always a danger of a gap — of losing the suspects during that period of time. I actually thought that under this legislation Dublin would be seen as "in the vicinity" of Dublin Airport. I was worrying about whether we were going out too far. The car park of the airport is a great problem for customs officers because until now, once the travellers got to the car park they were free of the customs authorities. The authorities were always worried about meeters and greeters getting into the car park with stuff. I think they should be slightly more extended than that.
The Minister referred to the question of co-operation between the European international customs agencies and authorities. That is quite a new thing. It is only six months old; only six months ago the customs authorities in Europe have come up with this. I am certain of this. It is in a Council of Europe report which I will produce if somebody doubts my word on it. It is something that has come up only in the last six months because until then there were many customs authorities in countries who had bipartisan or two-way agreements with each other, where country A could give information to country B but where country A could not give information to country D. There was not an overall agreement between customs authorities. The European Parliament's report of last year recommended that the customs authorities around the whole of the EC — I do not accept Senator Mooney's words that we are on the periphery of the EC, I think we are part of it and that is it.
The position is that information can now be made available. The importance of this is that, if the customs officers get, for instance, information of drugs passing through, coming into Dublin Airport, they know that there is somebody carrying this in a car, but what they are trying to do is to get at the heads behind the operation. They do not want to just lift the person with the couple of kilos of heroin, they want to know who is in charge of it. What they want to do is to follow the passage of that person through the State or from port to airport or from port to port or whatever. What I am worried about in this legislation is this. It would appear, under this legislation, that as soon as the person reached the airport car park or beyond it the customs authorities would have to wait for the Garda to come in. That is all right if there has been a pre-arrangement, but I want to be assured that that does not cause a problem of letting these people get away as it has done in the past.
The Minister said this is co-ordinating legislation. I accept it is co-ordinating legislation, but it does not clear up the mess. The fact is that every charge sheet under section 2 would have to have the 1876 Act, the 1956 Act, the 1977 Act, the 1984 Act and now the 1987 Act included in it. There have been cases in the Dublin area where judges have said they are not able to follow this list of charges and have asked for them to be thrown out and be taken in under the 1984 Act, which is the simplest one for the application of the law as it stands at present. I have called for and would call for all this to be taken under one piece of legislation; however, I know that point is slightly away from section 2 so I will not develop it.
Could the Minister tell me how the urine testing operation can be conducted if under this legislation the person is not required to give a sample? I am asking that under this legislation they should be required to give a sample.
I also want to know how the operation of following suspects through the State can be carried out, how they are traced through it. I am a member of the anti-strip searching group in Dublin at present but I believe that this is one case where, if customs officers have information that somebody is carrying in a body cavity, either as a stuffer or a swallower, suspects have to be searched. I can assure the Minister there are people a mile and a half away from here who are living in bits because these people are walking through customs quite regularly and have got away with the ill-gotten gain many times because of the frustration of our customs service who have not been able to deal with known carriers, who have walked free. I feel we have a responsibility here to tighten up in this area.
I began my contribution talking about checks and balances. I want the checks and balances, but I also want powers; and I think I have proved my point now. The legislation needs more extensive application and it also needs more certain checks and authorities. I would ask the Minister to come back to me on those points, about what happens if they are carrying something in their body and the suspect needs to be strip-searched, how the EMIT test can work if the person is not required to give a urine sample and should they not be required to do so under this legislation. Similarly, there is the question of the extended authority. I would ask the Minister to interpret again for me what he means by "at or in the vicinity of an airport", which is in the first part of section 2. Perhaps he would clear up those points.
Senator O'Toole has made some of the points which I wish to make and I will not go over the same ground. My reaction to the Minister's reply was one of total surprise. I would have a much more hard-line attitude on this. I thought his response surprising. The little bit of research I have done in this area from general reading and a close examination of the report of the Committee on Crime, Lawlessness and Vandalism has made it clear to me at least that many people smuggling drugs inject them. They are called swallowers or stuffers. By definition — and this is indelicate but it has to be said — the matter that has been swallowed or ingested has got to pass out through the system and no reference has been made in anything we said to defecation. We have concentrated on urine samples. I would like the Minister to tell me how this aspect is going to be dealt with if, as he says, there is no strip searching, no definite period of detention which would specifically allow for the elimination through the body of what was ingested. I see a fundamental weakness in the Bill of an unwillingness to face up to one of the prime modes of carrying or importing drugs into the country and I do not understand it.
The period of detention is, it appears, given the Minister's response, an area of discretion for the customs officer. The interesting thing is that detention has been built into the British legislation but in a far more specific manner. There, detention is allowed up to 36 hours and has to be renewed every six hours. Biology was not my strong point but I imagine there is a limit of time for an injested substance to pass through the body and come out the other end. I am disappointed that that is not tied down in this legislation, given that the Committee on Crime, Lawlessness and Vandalism has indicated that this is one of the prime ways in which drugs are imported into the country. Why do we have such looseness and such a lack of tightening up of these measures?
I would like to ask the Minister again if there would be regulations accompanying this piece of legislation or a statutory instrument or something which would give a specific indication of how this legislation was to be implemented. I am interested to hear that the vicinity of any port or airport is to be largely "a matter of commonsense," which is the phrase the Minister used in reply to my query on this. Of course I see that commonsense has to be part and parcel of any piece of legislation but I would have thought that it was necessary to be a little bit more specific in the legislation as to what the vicinity of any port or airport is. It is interesting that since we debated this Bill on Second Stage there has been a drug event in south-west Cork. Senator Vivian O'Callaghan made references on Second Stage to the number of ports and he was almost clairvoyant in his comments, I am not sure if he was the Senator who spoke but a Senator from the Cork region — Senator Tom Fitzgerald — spoke about the many ports and inlets etc., we had and the ease of access to them and the yachts and the various incursions that could be made. We had a ghastly example of what can happen. Of course, the security forces and the Customs and Excise people rallied, but to my knowledge the find has not quite been made yet and that must be very worrying. We want to guard against that type of importation of drugs that we are debating in this legislation. I ask the Minister to comment on why there is an absence of body search. What does he have to say about the elimination of ingested matter, the lack of a precise definition of the time span during which somebody can be detained, particularly in view of the British legislation on this matter? Does he wish to consider accompanying regulations or a statutory instrument in relation to this Bill.
It would appear that the legislation before us covers the meeters and greeters problem and extends the power of prison officers in that area. A second recommendation was made by the select committee on Crime, Lawlessness and Vandalism in relation to people who swallow drugs. So far as I know there are only two pieces of legislation under which people can be strip searched: the Misuse of Drugs Act and the Offences Against the State Act. That second recommendation ought to have been incorporated in this legislation. That is why we asked so many questions earlier on. What is the position of a customs officer if a person who is passing through the customs section of Dublin Airport elects to go through the green area and when asked to stop takes something out of his pocket, puts it into his month and swallows it? The customs officer has reasonable grounds to suspect that this person has put something into his mouth and swallowed it because he does not want it to be detected. Are the Garda called to carry out the necessary search in situations like this, or is there some constitutional reason why we cannot give this power to the customs officers?
I do not want to start an unnecessary row but it appears that what we have is an unhappy compromise where, because apparently nobody on the Government side wanted to think this through and build in the sort of safeguards that are built into the use of powers of search and in particular, detention by the Garda, we get a power of search which is circumscribed in such a way that it does not amount to a real search in the sense of what is needed to deal with the importation of drugs. According to what the Minister has said it would be a change in the powers of customs officers to allow body searches to be carried out by officers of the Customs and Excise. It is obviously a most distasteful and unpleasant task. It is also a most regrettable task but it is also, unfortunately, a very necessary requirement. It is the sort of delicate, sensitive, necessary requirement that can only be built into legislation that is properly balanced between the rights and necessities of protecting people from the horrors of drug abuse and the rights of the individual citizen.
This legislation — and indeed all the legislation in relation to the powers of the officers of Customs and Excise — does not contain the balance of an independent complaints procedure and regulations about how people are to be looked after in custody which exist in the areas where the Garda have such powers. Because of that it appears that the necessary powers are being circumscribed.
It would have been much better for the Minister and the Government to sit down and work out precisely what was needed and, having recognised that what was needed was fairly extreme, to build in precise and detailed safeguards to ensure that what was needed could be done in a fair and a balanced way. The suggestion that searches or, as the Minister described it frisking people, will result in the detection of significant or large scale attempts to import drugs defies belief. What does a Customs and Excise officer do in the precise case Senator Doyle described? I am very interested to hear the Minister's reply.
Those were some very interesting comments and questions. First I want to clarify the position as regards the powers of search which the customs officers have at present.
Customs officers may search without warrant any person who has entered the State by land, sea or air, the 1881, 1964 and 1968 Acts; any person suspected of an offence in relation to the exportation of goods, 1942 Act; and aircraft and ships, 1976 Act and 1964 regulations. They may search vehicles within 20 miles of the land frontier. I want to confirm for Senator Bulbulia that there is a 20 mile zone at the Border and if customs officers are suspicious of anything there they may search ad lib. They may search vehicles anywhere else in the State upon reasonable suspicion or probable cause. Customs officers may search under warrant any house, shop, cellar, warehouse or other place under sections 204 and 205 of the 1876 Act. They already have these powers to search travellers and people coming through customs.
The main thrust of this Bill, as some people have stated, is to have these powers conferred on the Customs and Excise officers so that they can deal with meeters and greeters at places of communication, airports, seaports, land frontiers or wherever. The general effect of section 2 is to confer officers of Customs and Excise powers similar to those already conferred on members of the Garda Síochána under the Misuse of Drugs Acts, 1977 and 1984. These are to retain and search, without warrant, but with reasonable cause where suspicion exists, persons, vehicles, vessels or aircraft for the purposes of detecting drug smuggling at or in the vicinity of points of entry and exits from the State, including the land frontier.
Every member of the Customs and Excise service engaged in the examination of passengers and goods at entry points to the country is regarded as forming part of a first line of defence against the illegal importation or exportation of drugs. When that first line of defence is breached, subsequent action within the State is primarily a Garda matter, with customs officers providing any assistance and co-operation required. In general the Garda are regarded as better equipped in terms of legal powers and resources to deal with the matter internally throughout the country.
A number of points were made by Senators. The urine tests are totally voluntary. They would be offered by the customs officer to the greeter, or traveller. It is a matter for that person to decide whether or not to do a voluntary test. Obviously if they refuse the test that is an indication that they are carrying some illegal object, drug or otherwise. It is up to the customs officer to take the necessary action to ensure that the law is operated.
Senator O'Toole talked about the very short lived co-operation of the international Customs and Excise services. We have found that, since the European Communities Act was passed in 1972, there has been very good co-operation, perhaps it is not very systematic but there is very good co-operation between——
I accept that.
——international agencies to detect people constantly smuggling drugs.
I want to refer to a point which I think was raised by Senator Bulbulia. If the customs people have been alerted by another agency, the Garda or otherwise, that a known stuffer or swallower is coming through the customs action is taken to ensure that no stone is left unturned and that every facet of the law is made available to the Garda Síochána and to the Customs and Excise officers. Senator O'Toole alluded to the fact that there are people only one and a half miles from this House who are in bits from the misuse of drugs. I recognise that. If hardened criminals who are known to be involved in peddling or carrying drugs come through customs the Garda Síochána are alerted. They take over and operate the Misuse of Drugs Act and use whatever resources they need in order to prove that the person is carrying drugs.
Senator Bulbulia also asked if we propose to bring forward regulations. We do not propose to bring forward any regulations. Under the Misuse of Drugs Act and the Customs and Excise Acts there are clear guidelines set down for the Garda or the Customs and Excise officers. In this case it will be the Revenue Commissioners who will draw up clear guidelines which Customs and Excise officers will have to work to.
Senator O'Toole and Senator Doyle expressed the view that they want the law to be strong enough so that there are no loopholes to allow people get through the net. We have to balance that against the situation whereby we cannot violate the personal integrity or the privacy of the person. If a Customs and Excise officer feels that people coming through, a meeter or greeter, a traveller or otherwise, has receipts or is carrying drugs on their person, if necessary the investigation would include a request to that person to remove all of their garments and, in particular, their outer garments. At no time is it contemplated that Customs and Excise officers would investigate the orifices of the body. That is the limit we would go to.
Senator Ryan stated that the Government side of the House had not thought this Bill out and that the powers we were conferring were insufficient. This Bill has been long thought out. We have had expert advice. The top officers in Customs and Excise, the Revenue Commissioners and the Department of Finance have been working on this Bill with the Minister and we are satisfied that the powers we are conferring on Customs and Excise officers are the ones already conferred on the Garda. These powers have proved very satisfactory and we are confident that they will be a major deterrent in combating drugs coming into the country.
Senator Doyle made the point about a person coming in to an airport or seaport and passing through the green area. Firstly, once people pass through a green area they automatically declare that the goods they have are legal and that the dues thereon are properly discharged. If one is detected as having something one should not have one has automatically committed a crime by going through the green area. That would be crime number one.
Secondly, if a person swallowed something and tried to create a situation whereby it would be almost impossible for the Customs and Excise officer to proceed to prove something, then the Garda would be called. They would take over and under the Misuse of Drugs Act they would proceed to examine, prove, prosecute and so on.
I want to thank the Minister for a very full reply to the questions that were asked. However, I am very unhappy because I believe there are loopholes in this legislation. I understand that urine testing is voluntary, but I am astonished that the Minister is allowing it to be voluntary. The Minister said he understands the problems of people. I meet people every day who are looking at used needles, all sorts of excretions, urine and vomit from young kids who are being destroyed by drugs being brought into the country by these vandals.
I appreciate what the Bill is trying to do, and I agree with it; but we have almost reversed roles since the start of the discussion. I was talking about the need for checks and balances but I now believe we are not giving enough powers to the Customs and Excise people. I know this is not the most tasteful conversation to be having around tea time but we must be pragmatic about it. If somebody walks through the customs area with a package of heroin stuffed up their back passage a urine test will not identify that. A Customs and Excise officer does not have the authority to do a close internal body search of the person in terms of investigating body cavities to find the drugs. A person could voluntarily give a urine sample which would not identify him or her as carrying anything and in that sense they can clear themselves. If there is a reasonable suspicion, by virtue of information supplied or whatever, that somebody is carrying drugs, then the person should be subjected to a test. It is unfair on the people of this country who are suffering at the hands of these criminals that we are now about to enact legislation which will allow drug carriers to escape the net.
The Minister can stand up and say that the Garda can be informed and the case can be taken a bit further by them. I know that, but why should they be allowed out of the net? We can give them the authority at the first line of defence or the first line of attack — the words we use depend on the perspective — to carry out a test if it becomes necessary. The Minister will understand that I am not saying that this should be abused. I would want built-in safeguards with regard to the use of these tests.
The Minister has not explained to me why a detained person may not be required to submit to a medical examination or to give a urine sample and how this benefits the person who is suffering at the end of the line. If we do not do that, the Bill will be full of loopholes; and I cannot see how it is going to meet the objectives as outlined by the Minister in his speech on Second Stage. We are now creating further loopholes.
There is one other point I am not clear about in this area in terms of the powers of the Garda. Is it right to say that under the 1984 Act that the Garda do have body search powers? Could the Minister clarify the position on that, because I am not clear what the Garda can do when they become involved.
I was very pleased to hear the Minister say that there would be specific guidelines. That takes care of my question in relation to regulations, a statutory instrument, or the spelling out of the way in which this would be implemented on the ground. I see that the legislation clearly meets the situation of meeters and greeters but I am concerned that it does not meet the clearly outlined situation from the Select Committee on Crime, Lawlessness and Vandalism, and recognised by the Minister, of the swallowers and stuffers.
We have heard lengthly explanations about urine testing and detention but the Bill seems to overlook one of the prime ways in which drugs are imported. It may be that the Misuse of Drugs Act will take care of this when the Garda come into the picture. I am not clear about that. Is that what the Minister is saying? I understand that there is a power of search contained in that legislation but I do not understand why we are giving such limited powers to the Customs and Excise people when we know what the problem is and when we know that there is an appalling blight in the inner city of Dublin, and emerging in other major cities in our country, as a consequence of the importation of illegal drugs. I cannot understand why there is not a total and complete sharp crack down on every facet which allows people to import this menace into our country. I am not happy about it. I never thought that I would be standing in a House of the Oireachtas advocating body searches. If we know that the prime way of bringing in illegal drugs is by way of ingestion or stuffing, then why are we not taking clear and unequivocal steps in our legislation to meet this problem?
I am not happy with the Minister's response. He talked about known stuffers and swallowers and said that they would be dealt with within the powers of discretion and legislation given to the Customs and Excise people. However, there will be other people who will not be known or who will not emerge as a consequence of a tip-off from the international network, which the Minister has alluded to, but where the instincts of a particular customs officer will indicate to him that perhaps somebody should be apprehended. I would like the Minister to give reassurances and tell me why he feels that this section of the legislation meets the problem which we know to exist and which the select Committee on Crime, Lawlessness and Vandalism pointed out to us in their very full and complete report.
I want to say that 99.9 per cent of all people coming through customs posts create no difficulty for the people of the country or the Customs and Excise officers. It would be our considered opinion, from the records of the Garda and the records of the Customs and Excise people who have dealt with drugs over the years, that a minimum percentage of drugs are brought through by swallowers and stuffers. We are virtually certain of that.
On a point of order, the Garda officer in charge of the Drugs Squad, at the most recent meeting of the co-ordinating national committee on drugs abuse, said that the majority of drugs come through in this way.
If the Senator reflects for a moment and goes back to what Senator Bulbulia alluded to earlier——
Hard drugs.
Perhaps the Senator was out of the House when Senator Bulbulia alluded to a recent case. A large volume of drugs are brought into the country by various means, but the proportion being carried by swallowers and stuffers, as far as our knowledge goes, would be smaller than that coming in in any other way.
Senator O'Toole, Senator Bulbulia and Senator Doyle stated that the powers in the Bill are not sufficient to deal with this situation. Firstly, we know the rights Customs and Excise officers have. Secondly, if they have any suspicions, they can detain people for questioning and otherwise. If swallowers and stuffers are carrying drugs, they recognise and realise that if they are detained for a certain period it would be detrimental to their physical condition. They will admit this, which they have done, and allow the Customs and Excise officers and the Garda to enforce the law. We know that on many occasions prior information is given by the Garda and other Customs and Excise people that these swallowers and stuffers are on their way into the country. Of course, the Customs and Excise officers are vigilant. Apart from their own perception or suspicion of any given situation, or if they are acting on a tip-off — and they would often be in that situation — they would, of course, have gardaí on stand-by to ensure that persons are examined thoroughly under the Misuse of Drugs Act, 1977, and that they are brought to justice.
As a State, and in law, we must balance the rights of the individual vis-á-vis the needs of the community. There is constitutional protection for the citizen and we must balance that vis-á-vis the powers we transfer and the needs of the community. The powers conferred on the Garda heretofore have had a large measure of success and we are confident that giving these extra powers now to Customs and Excise officers will reduce still further the opportunity and the options available to people who want to bring in drugs.
The Minister made reference to the south-west Cork importation, which I understand was lumps of cannibas resin.
A half ton.
Presumably it was not in a big block and that it was various chunks. It is the sort of substance that could not be the subject of ingestion or insertion. What we are talking about in relation to that method of importation of drugs is, I suspect, heroin and cocaine, minute quantities of which can cause mayhem and the destruction of people and communities. This situation already obtains in our capital city and elsewhere.
The Minister said, and Senator O'Toole argued the point, that a minimum percentage of drugs is brought in by swallowers and stuffers. I could not accept that lightly because the percentage, although small, can do untold damage. Despite all that the Minister has said, there is a fundamental weakness in this area of the Bill which is not being addressed. For that reason I am not happy about it.
I am most unhappy. I would say to the Minister that in all honesty we are not doing people a service by letting this section through. I agree that it improves the powers of the Customs and Excise officers and that it will have a certain positive effect. However, we are legislating a loophole here. On my point of information, I was obviously referring to hard drugs. The Garda authorities have stated that most of the hard drugs are now coming in by suffers and swallowers. That is their stated public position, unless it has changed in the last week.
Why are we letting this section go through without giving the powers which can deal with this? Why are we not saying that, if we have suspicions about somebody, they should be subject to a close internal body search or other tests which they would be required to co-operate with? Will the Minister tell me why we are not doing this?
I accept his point that we must find the balance between civil rights and civil liberty and the common good. I will re-emphasise my agreement with the Minister on this point. But what good is that doing us if these people are walking free? They are walking free. There are people who have made their money in this way.
A prisoner who is in Mountjoy Jail at present will be out in five year's time. He has £750,000 stashed in the banks and everybody knows that this is money from drugs which came in in people's bodies.
What the Minister said about people who have drugs inside their bodies is not true, and I do not believe that he believes it himself because he knows the way it works. There is a conflict in what the Minister said in regard to this. In his earlier presentation he said that he was talking about a period of 15 or 20 minutes, or perhaps an hour. The Minister might clarify this. I can assure the Minister that these people will stay in custody until the stuff bursts inside them and they die, because they do not do this kind of thing of their own volition; they do it because they are under pressure. Perhaps their family members are being blackmailed, kidnapped or whatever in some other state. Many of these people are not doing this voluntarily. However, others are doing it to feed their habit, and this is just as much a driving force and motivation.
I would appeal to the Minister to recognise that, while we support what he is saying as far as it goes, all we are asking is that he takes on board what we have just said and perhaps come back on Report Stage to see how we can deal with these points.
I want to make a few comments on this section. The Minister must realise how serious this problem is, when the two Senators who are making this case are Senators who normally are very conscious of the rights of people. They would be the last people in the world who would be looking for additional powers to search people or go through areas of privacy which none of us would condone in the normal course of events. Everybody in this House has an obligation to ensure that the importation of drugs by this method is stopped. On Second Stage, the Minister, Deputy MacSharry outlined the improvements that had taken place. We admitted that the improvement as outlined by him was an indication of the failure of Customs and Excise to come to grips with the problem simply because they did not have the legislative power to deal with it. Senators are suggesting that that power should be strengthened in some way to ensure that the smart alecs are not able to get past the first line of defence. We ask the Minister between now and Report Stage to consider this point seriously, particularly in the light of the Senators' contributions. The Minister should realise they are not lightly suggesting additional powers in this area.
This brings me to my final point. If we extend all these powers to the customs officers will they be subjected to the same critical analysis as members of the Garda Síochána? In other words, the Garda have to submit themselves to a Garda Complaints Board. Will the members of the Customs and Excise now also be expected to do the same to protect the rights of ordinary people?
Progress reported; Committee to sit again.