Mary Lou McDonald
Question:3. Deputy Mary Lou McDonald asked the Taoiseach if he will report on the work of the public service, justice and police reform division of his Department. [4088/23]
View answerWednesday, 15 February 2023
Questions (3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10)
Richard Boyd Barrett
Question:4. Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett asked the Taoiseach if he will report on the work of the public service, justice and police reform division of his Department. [5892/23]
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Paul Murphy
Question:5. Deputy Paul Murphy asked the Taoiseach if he will report on the work of the public service, justice and police reform division of his Department. [5895/23]
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Jim O'Callaghan
Question:6. Deputy Jim O'Callaghan asked the Taoiseach if he will report on the work of the public service, justice and police reform division of his Department. [6888/23]
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James Lawless
Question:7. Deputy James Lawless asked the Taoiseach if he will report on the work of the public service, justice and police reform division of his Department. [6890/23]
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Michael Moynihan
Question:8. Deputy Michael Moynihan asked the Taoiseach if he will report on the work of the public service, justice and police reform division of his Department [6900/23]
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Mick Barry
Question:9. Deputy Mick Barry asked the Taoiseach if he will report on the work of the public service, justice and police reform division of his Department. [6920/23]
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Ivana Bacik
Question:10. Deputy Ivana Bacik asked the Taoiseach if he will report on the work of the public service, justice and police reform division of his Department. [6926/23]
View answerOral answers (9 contributions)
I propose to take Questions Nos. 3 to 10, inclusive, together.
The public service, justice and policing reform unit is part of the wider social policy and public service reform division within the Department of the Taoiseach. The work of the unit assists me, in my role as Taoiseach, on criminal justice and policing reform, public service reform, social affairs and other related matters, assists the Civil Service management board, including the Civil Service renewal programme, and contributes to the oversight and governance of the new public services reform plan. The unit also assists the work of the Cabinet committee on social affairs and public services and the associated senior officials' group established to oversee implementation of programme for Government commitments in the areas of social policy, equality, integration and public services.
The policy areas covered include gender equality, which encompasses efforts to reduce domestic, sexual and gender-based violence; area-based disadvantage, where my Department is involved in new approaches to community safety and also chairs the programme board extending the lessons from the new model of intervention in the north-east inner city to other areas that experience disadvantage; and a broad range of other social affairs matters, including arts and culture, diversity, social inclusion and child poverty, migrant integration, the Irish language, and sport. The unit incorporates the policing reform implementation programme office which oversees the implementation of A Policing Service for our Future, the Government's plan to reform policing in Ireland in line with the report of the Commission on the Future of Policing in Ireland. In addition, the section has departmental oversight of the National Economic and Social Council, participates in relevant interdepartmental committees and other groups, and provides me with briefings and speech material on all related matters.
I have raised the case of Shane O'Farrell with the Taoiseach, as has Deputy McDonald. It is approaching 12 years since Shane was killed by a man who should have been in prison at the time and five years since the Dáil and Seanad adopted resolutions calling for an independent public inquiry into the actions of An Garda Síochána and other State agencies both before and after Shane's death. The Taoiseach's Government at the time ignored those resolutions and instead established a scoping exercise, something no one had sought. The failures of the policing and justice system in the lead-up to Shane's death and the actions thereafter and to this day are significant not only to his family but are in the wider public interest. Will the Taoiseach please indicate that the Government will advance the establishment of the independent inquiry that is so clearly warranted in this case?
There are major problems in processing basic but often urgent and critical applications for people in my local authority. I think it is part of the wider problem of recruitment and retention of staff in key areas of the public service. I will give just two examples. If people are looking for medical priority in the housing list, often in very serious situations, they are now having to wait between six and nine months in my area just to get the application processed. For example, Leo, who is 73 years and has chronic spinal problems, is couch-surfing. He has been waiting five months for his application to be processed. Then there is another case of a couple where the husband was recently diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer's. He can no longer work and the couple are in very serious difficulty with their housing assistance payment, HAP, tenancy because it was based on their previous earnings. They are trying to get medical priority but they have been waiting months. I could go on through the list. The picture is similar for people who are looking to get their social housing eligibility assessed based on the new thresholds. We need to do something to ensure that staff resources are there to address these matters in local authorities.
I want to ask the Taoiseach something I have raised with his predecessor many times. It is on the reality of a hard border that exists for non-EU migrants on this island. For example, someone who is married to an Irish or UK national could be living in the North perfectly legally as a refugee or migrant worker but would not be able to travel to the South freely. That is something that is entirely in the gift of the Government to resolve to give these people the right to travel. Will he agree to do that and get rid of that aspect of the hard border? There is another question that relates to the British Government but that would create significant pressure. Second, does the Taoiseach agree that time spent living in the North should contribute towards demonstrating a connection with the Irish State in terms of establishing a right to citizenship and that this should be treated the same as time living in the South? This is a shared island. People in the North should be able to apply for passports. Will the Taoiseach meet with the North West Migrant forum on these issues?
On public service reform, has the Taoiseach's attention been drawn to the retention of people in the public service, particularly in care? Those working as occupational therapists through to speech and language therapists, for example, are different from those working in other sectors of the public service. They work in the public service first and then go into private practice. There is an issue with home care assistants who are in the old home-help role. There are people who were in that role and have left it. These are valuable public services who are needed for the most vulnerable in our society. Has the Taoiseach looked at this? What is the State doing to ensure care staff are retained? They are much needed in society.
"It felt like they were treating us like animals. It didn't feel fair. It felt like they were violating our privacy." Workers at JD Sports in Patrick's Street in Cork have, in the last week, highlighted the fact that they are regularly asked to lift their tops and show their bare stomach area to store managers. The store says the policy is part of its campaign against shop lifting. It already has the right to search bags and jackets when workers leave the shop. There is a real power imbalance here. On the one hand, we have an international corporation which is predicted to make over £1 billion this year, while, on the other, we have a group of young workers from Cork. It would be helpful if the Taoiseach would comment on this in the Dáil and perhaps indicate whether he feels if there might be a basis for some legislative change to outlaw situations such as this.
I raise the inconsistency in delays for women seeking domestic violence orders as reported by Ciara Phelan in today's Irish Examiner. She has raised serious concerns that domestic violence victims and survivors are waiting up to four months in some cases for courts to hear safety applications. It is, in effect, a postcode lottery as to how long a woman will have to wait, ranging from 16 weeks, or four months, in Trim, County Meath, to 14 weeks in Tullamore, 12 weeks in Carlow and Nenagh and up to eight weeks in Bray, Clonmel and Ennis. This is a real concern, particularly as we are seeing such strong plans and ambitions at national level on tackling domestic and gender-based violence. The shortage of judges and the absence of consistency in approaches to these applications across different courts are really serious matters of concern. How will this be addressed? Are there plans to appoint more judges? How will these inconsistencies be solved?
Finally, on Garda recruitment, can a review be carried out on what needs to be addressed to improve the attractiveness with An Garda Síochána as we are seeing shortfalls in the numbers of gardaí recruited?
Yesterday, Cóilín Ó Scolaí and his wife, Irene Kavanagh, were at the Four Courts in relation to the death of their child Laoise Kavanagh Ní Scolaí in the Coombe Hospital in January 2015. She died as a result of her heart being pierced when she was only two days old. I am sure that the Taoiseach will agree that this was an absolutely heartbreaking scenario for the family. Incredibly, we have another family which has had to fight the HSE through the legal system for seven years just to achieve justice for their child. Yesterday, it emerged there was a settlement. Where is the accountability for what happened to Laoise? Where is the disciplinary action for that? Will anything happen to anyone as a result of what happened to this girl?
Once again, I extend my condolences to Shane O'Farrell's family on his sad death. A scoping exercise was done. I think it was by a retired judge. I have not seen the report but I know the Minister for Justice, Deputy Harris, is very keen to publish the report as soon as possible. He wants to put the published report out there. We want Members to be able to read it for themselves so that, having read the report, they can make an informed decision as to whether a further inquiry is appropriate.
I understand there have been a number of inquiries already. We are very keen to be fair to the O'Farrell family but we also need to be fair to those being inquired into. Many of them have been inquired into already and we have to bear that in mind, and the impact on them and their families.
The common travel area between Britain and Ireland and between Northern Ireland and the Republic Ireland only applies to UK and Irish citizens. It does not apply to EU or non-EEA citizens, and that causes problems for them. I have raised it in my conversations with Prime Minister Sunak, particularly in the context of the proposal to bring in an electronic travel authorisation, ETA. That would make life unnecessarily hard for EU and non-EEA nationals who regularly cross the Border. That is a concern we have.
On the matters raised by the Deputy, I do not know enough about the details of that area. I appreciate he raised it with the Tánaiste when he was Taoiseach but I do not want to say something that may turn out to be incorrect without a proper understanding of it. If the Deputy sends me a short note on it or something, I will take a look into it and see if there is something practical we can do to help people to cross the Border freely, as they should be allowed to do, but does not have other implications that I may not have considered.
On the general question of public service recruitment and retention, public bodies and private companies across the board are struggling to recruit and retain staff. That is true in the public and private sectors and in almost every sector of the economy, among big companies and small, well-paid jobs and poorly paid. It is a reflection of the fact we have close to full employment in Ireland, which we have rarely had in our history. It is very much an employee's market. There is no sector of our economy or society that is not struggling to recruit and retain staff at the moment. I would rather be in this position of close to full employment than there being 10% or 20% unemployment, when recruitment and retention would be much easier, but it is a problem nonetheless.
What we are doing, particularly when it comes to health and social care, is increasing dramatically the number of people we train as nurses, doctors, therapists and health and social care professionals, recognising that the world has changed, people change careers and travel and, just to stand still, we need to train and recruit more than we did in the past. We are adjusting our policies to do exactly that.
The issue of Garda recruitment is linked to that. We have funding for 1,000 additional gardaí this year and that should be more than enough to cover retirements and resignations. We hope to see a net increase in the number of gardaí this year, heading towards a target of 15,000. I discussed this with the Garda Commissioner when I met him before Christmas. Recruitment slowed down greatly in the past two years because of the restrictions related to Covid. He and the Minister are confident it can increase significantly in the coming months. We need to see if that happens, but that is the position, as they are informing me.
I prefer not to comment on the issue in relation to JD Sports. I am not aware of the incidents that are happening. The first I heard of it was now. There may already be labour law or other laws covering this area. I am not able to comment without knowing all the facts or the current legal position.
On District Court waiting times, it is a Government priority to ensure the courts are resourced to administer justice efficiently and effectively. That is central to ensuring there is access to justice. The Courts Service works closely with the Judiciary to address backlogs and prioritise urgent work. However, a whole-of-system approach is required in order to address systemic challenges. The Minister for Justice is optimistic that both implementation of the recommendations of the judicial planning working group and the commitment by the Courts Service in its corporate strategic plan to maximise use of digital technologies to provide a more efficient and user-centred service will lead to improved efficiencies and shorter waiting times in due course. The Minister is very much aware of the delays in proceedings on vulnerable victims and it is important to point out that applications for urgent interim domestic violence orders are prioritised by the courts and are heard in the District Court on the day the application is made or at the next court sitting. The Minister, Deputy Harris, has requested a report on the disparity in waiting times between districts for family law domestic violence applications from the Courts Service. Waiting times for other domestic violence applications vary across districts but the majority hear these applications at the next sitting.
Like everyone, I have seen the newspaper and media reports on baby Laoise Kavanagh. I think we all feel for the Ó Scolaí and Kavanagh family and what they have endured. For everyone in this House it is difficult to comment on an individual case. None of us knows all the details and it would take anyone a long time to be fully across all the details of any medical case of this nature. When it comes to individual responsibility, where it relates to a doctor it is done through the Medical Council and where it relates to a midwife it is done through the Nursing and Midwifery Board of Ireland.