Seanad Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 24 May 1995

Vol. 143 No. 10

Adjournment Matters. - RGDATA Crime Survey.

Mr. Cosgrave

I welcome the Minister for Justice to the House and I thank the Chair for allowing me to raise this important matter on the Adjournment. It is a matter of which the Minister is fully aware. I hope she and her Government colleagues will be able to respond positively. I am aware of their concern about urban crime.

I raise this matter following the RGDATA survey, which paints a bleak and disturbing picture. There is no doubt that action must be taken. As a result of greater security in the premises of banks, building societies and other places which were the targets of old for robberies, the gangs — often Dublin based — and individual thieves have switched their attacks to smaller suburban groceries and business premises where sums of money are held. We must respond quickly to meet this challenge.

The Minister will be aware of the many vicious attacks on shopkeepers and their staff, both young and old. Vicious assaults and muggings have resulted in serious injuries, people being hospitalised and even fatalities. The attacks appear to be focused more on the suburbs and on areas which are probably more difficult to police. There is no immediate and complete solution to this problem. The Minister and her colleagues as well as the Garda Síochána have sought to address the problem. I hope that she will meet, if she has not done so already, members of RGDATA to hear about their concerns and the state of fear in which they live. This fear also affects ordinary individuals. One need only reflect on last night's headline in the Evening Herald which spoke of a vicious attack on a woman in her eighties. The thieves took her hearing aid. These attacks, particularly on the old, are becoming more vicious and cowardly. We have also seen these so-called Dublin gangs involved in abductions and kidnappings. There is probably a drug related aspect to some of those crimes.

It is important that we tackle this problem. That will not be easy. Obviously, other elements must be involved. The Minister made some positive suggestions about the bail laws. I hope there will be a ready response, because these times are different from 30 years ago when important decisions were handed down by the courts. There is also the ongoing question of insurance costs, which add to the problems of people who are running small businesses and operating on reasonably small profit margins. They cannot afford the services of security firms. Obviously, they can take certain precautions which are valuable.

The "Crimeline" programme, which is shown on television on the first Monday of each month, reports on the vicious crimes being carried out by vicious individuals in society. I hope for the Minister's total commitment to eradicating this problem. I hope she will discuss it with the Garda Síochána and, whether or not she decides on a task force to respond to the problem, I hope she will not be found wanting. The Minister is well aware of the situation as there have been unfortunate incidents in her own constituency. It is important that this House signals our abhorrence of this situation and our willingness to tackle it.

Minister for Justice (Mrs. Owen)

I thank Senator Cosgrave for raising this issue. The question of establishing a task force on violent crime in shops was one of the many issues raised at a meeting I had with representatives of RGDATA on 12 May. At that meeting I received a copy of the organisation's report Violence in Shops which was compiled over the past two years. There is genuine concern about the level of crime and the Government regards it as unacceptable that people going about their lawful business should be subject to attack by criminals. I have discussed with the Garda Commissioner the findings of the report and the adoption of an innovative and comprehensive approach to tackling the crime problem.

Without in any way minimising the information in the RGDATA report, the Garda have given me some figures today from 1993 and 1994 in relation to attacks and burglaries in the retail outlets throughout the country. I will be coming back to that issue with the Garda. The figures the Garda have given are somewhat different to those in the RGDATA report. That is not to minimise the awfulness of being subject to attack when going about one's business.

There are approximately 30,000 retail outlets. In 1993 4 per cent of those outlets were subject to burglaries; that is 1,137 premises. In 1994 the figure was slightly down to 3 per cent, or 1,006 burglaries. There is some conflict in the figures in the report and the recorded figures for burglaries in shops. I recognise there will always be burglaries that will not be reported, although most business premises have to report crime for insurance purposes.

I requested from the Garda Commissioner his views on setting up a task force under his guidance. When these views become known to me I will take up the matter again with RGDATA. The Commissioner also confirmed that the Garda are taking strong action to address the increasing level of attacks on shops. They report a number of successful arrests of culprits in the past few months particularly. It is important to note there is probably a small number of people responsible for a great number of the burglaries that take place. Many of them have already been arrested, will serve a sentence, come out of prison and, unfortunately, get back into the same crime. When successful arrests are made and people are put away, one sees an instant drop in the number of crimes committed. It is important that those people serve a full sentence and stay in prison for its duration.

It has already been agreed this year to provide £413 million for the Garda — the highest amount ever. The allocation of an amount of this magnitude will be of assistance to the Garda in the fight against crime by enabling the following measures to be taken: the recruitment of 1,050 gardaí during the next three years; implementation of an information technology plan for the Garda Síochána and the upgrading of the Garda communications network; installation of closed circuit television cameras to combat crime in certain areas — they have already been introduced in the Temple Bar area of Dublin; further development of community based measures in areas of disadvantage — I recently announced another such community based measure in the Blanchardstown area in Dublin in which we hope to bring on board a number of youths who would, perhaps, otherwise find their way into lives of crime; measures to combat serious fraud, including the implementation of certain non-legal proposals of the Government's advisory committee on fraud.

In addition, there are approximately 700 clerical civilian staff employed in the Garda Síochána at present. Additional funding is being provided this year, next year and in 1997 to employ a further 200 civilian staff in the Garda Síochána. All of these civilians will replace gardaí on a one for one basis, releasing them from administrative duties to perform police work for which they were specially selected and trained. This will lead to a substantial increase in the operational strength of the force.

Adding new gardaí by recruitment is one way to increase the strength of the Garda. Another way is to increase the operational strength by releasing gardaí from jobs that are important but are not what citizens consider police work. When calculations are made of the number of gardaí available now compared to other years, they should not forget that more gardaí are doing more operational work and fewer gardaí doing office work that can be done by civilians.

It is unacceptable that any group, such as the people RGDATA has highlighted, should be exposed to such attacks. The Garda authorities and I are determined to continue to do everything in our power to effectively deal with these attacks.