Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 26 May 2015
107. Deputy Pádraig Mac Lochlainn asked the Minister for Justice and Equality if she will immediately publish all submissions received by her Department in relation to the new policing authority, in order that Oireachtas Members can consider them, and to assist with potential amendments to the Bill as it moves through the Houses of the Oireachtas. [19811/15]
View answerI believe I submitted a parliamentary question about the matter, but I wanted to raise it today. It relates to submissions made to the Department about the now published legislation for the new policing authority. Will the Minister publish all those submissions to assist Deputies, including Deputies Niall Collins, Clare Daly, Wallace and me, who will be engaging with the legislation through Committee and Report Stages, and so on?
The Deputy's question relates to submissions received. I am making arrangements for all submissions to be published in the next couple of days. I will put all the relevant material - there is a lot of it - on the Department's website, www.justice.ie. They were taken into account in the preparation of the Garda Síochána (Policing Authority and Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2015, which I published last week. The new Bill provides for the establishment of the independent policing authority to oversee the performance of the policing functions of An Garda Síochána and it is at the core of our reforms in the justice area. It is a fundamental reform of policing oversight in Ireland. It is the most far-reaching reform of An Garda Síochána since the foundation of the State.
As we will be discussing in the House, it allows a new independent forum for the public oversight of policing services in Ireland. In particular, under the new arrangements senior gardaí will report to the authority on the performance of policing services, including by way of public meetings. The authority can provide a key role in being an engine to drive reforms of the policing system and practices to ensure that An Garda Síochána is fit to meet the demands of 21st century policing.
The new Bill is awaiting Second Stage in the Seanad and I look forward to its passage through the Houses. Approximately 30 submissions were received from a wide range of groups, including the Deputy's party. They will all be on the website in the next few days.
I welcome the Minister's confirmation. I express concern over a few areas. Garda Síochána officers, to whom I have spoken over recent years, have told me there is an issue in terms of a meritocracy over recruitment. This applies not just to senior officers but goes through the ranks. We need better oversight not just of the appointment of assistant commissioners up to the Commissioner but also to include promotions to the level of sergeant, inspector, superintendent and chief superintendent - from the very bottom to the very top.
While the police board in the North of Ireland appoints senior officers in the North, it also has oversight of the recruitment and promotion process throughout the ranks. I seek reassurance on that.
Even at present there is misunderstanding about some of the appointments. The most senior appointments are subject to an independent process at present, with a lay chairperson and two lay members of the panel. Clearly what we are doing with the new policing authority represents a sea-change on appointments. The authority will now have responsibility for overseeing the process of those senior appointments.
That is quite a change. The authority will be responsible for selecting the process to be used. It is expected that, in some instances, it will use the public appointments service and, in others, the body which oversees public appointments generally. It now has the authority to make the decision on how the process will be conducted. There have been suggestions of politicisation in Garda appointments, but I certainly have no experience of this, nor did my predecessor. To ensure the transparency people now demand, the police authority clearly will have a critical role.
The difficulty is that the legislation does not address the appointment of sergeants to the position of superintendent and, possibly, chief superintendent. That is where there is a big issue. I submitted ten questions to the Minister six months ago. Her response at the time was that she would refer them to the Garda Commissioner, but I have yet to receive responses to them. My concerns are around the level of oversight by the Department and, soon I hope, the police authority of the entire promotions process in An Garda Síochána. In the context of the debate on reform, this needs to happen from the bottom up, including how people are promoted, with independent oversight. I have concerns about this issue, as reflected in my questions. I ask that they be responded to as soon as possible.
My second concern relates to the independent adjudicator, an issue we dealt with in the context of the Garda Síochána (Amendment) Bill. If the police authority asks questions of An Garda Síochána and it responds that it cannot provide information for security reasons, an independent adjudicator, namely, a judge, rather than the Minister, should oversee the process so as to remove any accusation of a Minister being too close to the Garda and so on.
These are the two issues I want to flag as being of concern to me.
The Deputy is getting into the detail of the Bill. No doubt, we will have a robust discussion on these issues when the Bill is brought before the House. It is extremely important that the Garda Commissioner has operational responsibility and is independent in dealing with operational issues. Obviously, a particular number of appointments come within the internal process within An Garda Síochána and it is envisaged that this will continue up to a certain point. We can have further discussions on this issue during the course of the passage of the Bill.
This is the first time a definition of "security" has been set out in legislation. There is, for example, clarity and a clear exemption for advocacy in order that people will not think we are using the definition of security, for example, to say peaceful protest would not be allowed. This is very important and will help in appropriately deciding what comes within the remit of policing because uniquely in this country An Garda Síochána deals with policing and security issues.
