I move: "That the Bill be now read a Second Time."
I wish to share my time with Deputy Rabbitte.
The Bill before us is the Road Traffic (Joyriding) Bill, 2002. It is entitled: "An Act to provide for the offences of supplying or offering to supply a vehicle to an under-age driver and of organising, directing or participation in the unlawful taking of a mechanically propelled vehicle for the purposes of dangerous driving in a public place, for that purpose to extend the Road Traffic Acts, 1961 to 2002, and to provide for related matters."
My great predecessor in this House, former Deputy and Minister Conor Cruise O'Brien, who represented Dublin North East, was an outstanding historian and distinguished political philosopher. A common thread which runs through his books is that of political responsibility. O'Brien believes, as enunciated in his life's writings, that at the end of the day people who exercise Executive power must take responsibility for their words, actions and inaction. That central concept is a very valuable political ideal. When applied to the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, Deputy O'Donoghue, it shows the Minister is clearly found wanting. The Labour Party introduced this Bill two and a quarter years ago on a February or March night. We requested the Minister to consider urgently the issues with which the Bill was concerned, including possible remedies and, if necessary, to consider, in whatever way he saw fit, amending the Bill. I raised these issues on a number of occasions with the Minister face to face and by way of letters and Adjournment debates. It seemed he would take responsibility for the incredible grief, carnage and suffering caused by car-related crime and that he would seek to take a major initiative to cope with it. Our Bill, which he may have amended, would have formed the first plank of that initiative. However, the Minister is now leaving office and he has not taken this responsibility. He has failed in a key element of his duty as a political leader.
This is the 31st occasion in this Chamber on which I have raised the issue of car theft and joyriding crime. I raised it on many occasions on the Order of Business when the Taoiseach either mumbled replies or simply refused to answer. I raised it during many Adjournment debates, including on 11 November 1999 when I pointed out the urgent need to provide substantial resources for youth education, sport and leisure and to support the anti-joyriding task force in Dublin North East, etc. I received a couple of replies from the Taoiseach, Deputy Bertie Ahern. I wrote to the Garda Commissioner, Mr. Byrne, dating back two and a half or three years ago. As Labour Party spokesperson on social, community and family affairs, I beseeched him to work with the Minister on perhaps bringing forward a programme. I am aware that he and many senior gardaí have been very supportive of the Labour Party's efforts in this regard over the years.
I wrote to the Minister, Deputy O'Donoghue, on 3 February 2000, as follows:
Dear John,
You will remember that on about a dozen occasions in this present Dáil I have raised the persistent and very dangerous crime of so-called joyriding with An Taoiseach and yourself in Dáil Éireann. Following these interventions and brief discussions with you, an Anti-Joyriding Task Force was established on the northside of Dublin. The Task Force, ably assisted by Inspector Seamus Kane of Coolock Gardaí and local residents, have suggested a programme of urgently needed actions to end the joyriding menace once and for all.
The letter stated that in the west and south sides of Dublin, north Cork city and Limerick city there was also this modern urban plague. I outlined a number of measures, including a programme of education, particularly the attempt to retain in school for as long as possible young people in the most disadvantaged areas. I outlined the consideration of a specific car mechanic and driving educational course, of which there were one or two examples in Dublin city and elsewhere, the urgent provision of a comprehensive youth service, particularly in the most disadvan tages parishes, and the urgent provision of local sports facilities. I instanced a number of football clubs and Gaelic clubs which up to then had not received substantial funding.
I outlined the urgently needed support for existing community and social centres, which do such a brilliant job but are very under-resourced, and additional resources for gardaí in the areas of joyriding crime. I referred specifically to an anti-joyriding specialist Garda task force to deal with the measure along the lines of other serious activities such as drug-related crime and fraud. I mentioned the urgent necessity to pass legislation to cover gaps in the law. I suggested to the Minister where the Labour Party and its advisers felt there were significant gaps which made the work of the Garda more difficult and created more problems and suffering for people living in these communities. I suggested this would be the beginning of a comprehensive attack on the problem. Since this urban plague, as the Labour Party Leader, Deputy Quinn, referred to it, emerged in the late 1970s it has not been a simple problem. It is not a problem which needs knee-jerk solutions but one which must be worked at in a very comprehensive manner such as drug-related crime. We hope to use the legislation to spark a debate and to get the Minister to launch a programme of action which would, perhaps, have avoided the dreadful tragedy which we recently witnessed.
It is ironic that the northside anti-joyriding task force received funding for its first co-ordinator, Ms Breda Collins, the day after the slaughter of two gardaí. Why did it take two and a half years for this simple measure, long requested by northside communities, to take shape? The Labour Party's attempt, which has been ongoing for a long time, to find an answer to this crime culminated in a seminar held at the City Arts Centre on 14 February 2000, the prospectus for which was entitled Joyriding – Can we find a solution. That seminar was addressed by community leaders from around the country and by my party leader.
Many communities at that time looked to the Labour Party to provide the spurring into action of the Government. Unfortunately, those efforts have been largely ignored by the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, Deputy O'Donoghue, over the past two and a half years. In April 2000, at the culmination of our campaign, I tabled the original version of the Road Traffic (Joyriding) Bill. The Bill proposed the creation of two new offences and would have created a new offence of organising, directing or participating in the taking of a vehicle for the purposes of that vehicle being driven in a public place in a manner which is dangerous to the public. In other words, it made joyriding a specific offence. The Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform has said many times – he may say it again tomorrow night, if there is a tomorrow for the 28th Dáil – that a provision in the 1961 Act dealing with "unauthorised takings", as the Garda refers to them, covers the area of joyriding. This activity, which has been written about extensively for the past week and a half since the tragic deaths of Garda Tighe and Garda Padden, should be identified as a specific crime and we must deal with it in a very serious manner.
The Bill also aimed to deal with the problem of company cars, a major feature of the joyriding problem in many disadvantaged areas. This problem relates to youths who drive illegally. They purchase old cars for little or nothing, perhaps €30 or €40, and use them for joyriding. The Bill would have made it an offence to supply a vehicle to an under age person in such circumstances as to give rise to reasonable apprehension that the vehicle would be used by an under age driver in a public place. That Bill and the current Bill provides for new penalties of up to seven years in prison and for periods of disqualification from driving of up to five years.
I thought on the first night of the debate on this issue two and a half years ago the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, Deputy O'Donoghue, and the Minister for the Environment and Local Government, Deputy Dempsey, and their colleagues would adopt the Bill and make whatever changes they felt necessary in consultation with the Garda Síochána and the Attorney General. I was completely gobsmacked when it became clear on the Wednesday that they were going to oppose it. Is it not astonishing that the second most senior garda in this country has said in the past couple of days that there is no legal provision to deal with company cars. The Labour Party Bill which contained such a provision would have been a valuable addition to the Minister's legal armoury. The criminals who give, transfer or sell cars to children should be severely dealt with. They have a grave responsibility, yet the Minister has been seen, by his behaviour, to treat this problem as though insignificant.
Joyriding is a complex problem. Glancing over my contribution on the previous Bill, I note I mentioned my party's reservations about calling this a joyriding Bill. I remember having a long discussion on this issue at Dublin City Council where many members from disadvantaged areas suggested we should call it death-riding or grief-riding given the carnage and despair it causes in communities. As joyriding is the name by which this activity has been known over the past couple of decades, we felt it should be identified in the title of the Bill.
I am aware there are many aspects to finding a solution to this problem. I am disappointed the Children Bill has taken five years of development from the point at which the rainbow Government left it. We created the central ideas of the Children Bill, with care for the victim, restitution and the engagement of parental responsibility, with the creation of much needed places for children in serious trouble. Five years have passed, yet very little action has taken place. The Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, Deputy O'Donoghue, has, in the dying days of this Dáil, succeeded in having that Bill passed and is now trying to implement it. Last week, I contrasted the generosity of the rainbow Government to that of the Minister, Deputy O'Donoghue, regarding legislation in that on important legislation, such as this Bill, he defiantly refused to take action.
One of the problems in early 2000 and before has been that many sections of the media do not seem to take this issue seriously. The reason is simple, it depends on where one lives. If one lives in a leafy southside retreat or in a rural idyllic location, the problems of joyriding, drug-related crime, harassment, downright mayhem and incipient civil insurrection do not bother one too much but if one lives in or near clearly disadvantaged areas the problems of youth crime are endemic, appalling and very frustrating for community leaders who, perhaps, have worked hard for 20 years or more trying to make their communities a better place in which to live.
At 11 p.m. on the Thursday night before the assassination of Garda Tighe and Garda Padden while talking to my chief poster man – the kind of valuable comrades we all have at times like this – a car was driven by in an appalling and dangerous manner. It was a busy evening on a busy urban street. The No. 27 bus was travelling in both directions carrying children home from various activities. What was happening was appalling and people were scattering for their lives. This issue, until recently, has not been taken as seriously as it should have been by some sections of the media. In early 2000 a certain individual, an idiot, who wrote in The Irish Times berated me because I dared to ask the Labour Party to spend three hours of parliamentary time discussing this problem, as if an issue that affects urban communities and some rural areas on the edge of the city should not be addressed in this House. That attitude has made it very difficult for us to come to grips with the problem.
The Dublin Labour Party, since the class of 1991, as I call them, on Dublin City Council and the three county councils have long had a very strong approach to the issue of crime and urban deprivation. Indeed, before the "Blairites" came up with the term, it is fair to say that my distinguished and late colleague, Pat Upton, Deputy Shortall, former Deputy Costello, Deputies Ryan, Rabbitte and Gilmore and former Deputy Byrne, who will, I hope, be back in this House shortly, and my friend and colleague, Alderman Conaghan developed a very strong programme of measures to try to move resources to our most deprived communities and address some of the residual issues. We focused on matters such as early school leaving, intensive support for youth, including sports facilities, and more localised policing. We tried to obtain that through the anti-crime committee on Dublin City Council. At the end of the day we wanted the identification, punishment and detention of people who continue to terrorise neighbourhoods whether through drugs, harassment or the misuse of vehicles.
The events of the past week and a half have obviously horrified the nation. The appalling sadness of the families of Garda Tighe and Garda Padden brought home to us the heartache this problem has caused. A couple of years ago I recalled the sorrowful list of deaths and injuries caused by car theft and car related crime. In the mid 1990s I arrived on a scene in north Coolock where two children had been mowed down. There were the frightful deaths in early 1999 of the hackney driver, Derek Hall, from Tallaght and a young DJ, Mark Bryan, a popular man from Dun Laoghaire. Many of those involved in local community development and in the Labour Party were devastated by the deaths of Richie and Christine Green in early 1999. We understand the sorrow experienced by the close relatives and friends of the two valiant gardaí in Mayo and south Dublin. One of my chief mentors when I commenced in politics and community development who encouraged me and others at every turn was Richie Green. There was mention by Fianna Fáil politicians in Dublin North Central of erecting a memorial to Richie Green. The best memorial to Richie would be to devise a multifaceted approach to deal seriously with this problem once and for all. That is the memorial Richie, whom I knew well and who was a mentor to Deputy McDowell and me, would have wanted.
Under the stewardship of the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, Deputy O'Donoghue, car crime has escalated. This is obvious when we consider that the figure of almost 12,000 unauthorised takings when the rainbow Government left office has now risen to almost 16,000. The Minister is refusing to publish the 2001 figures which show a serious deterioration. As I said last week, the Garda report has split crimes into two categories, serious crimes and less serious crimes. All the crimes in those lists were very serious. As I mentioned on the last occasion on which I spoke on this matter, every week our colleagues on Dublin City Council and in the three county councils have to remove dozens of cars from particular areas. In a rural lane adjacent to my constituency – I represent a tiny part of rural Dublin – a small community on the northern fringe of the city has been horrendously terrorised in recent weeks. Unfortunately we have not come to grips with it. The Minister has a special responsibility in this area and I hold him equally responsible in the terms in which my predecessor, Conor Cruise O'Brien, would have identified political responsibility.
In 1996 Deputy Howlin put through the House the Waste Management Act. That clearly indicates that producers are ultimately responsible for the disposal of their products. One of the key problems in recent years has been that of scrappage and what to do with cars at the end of their life. I tried to deal with that under the company car provisions of this Bill. Along with Deputy Gilmore, my colleagues and I have been pressing the Minister for the Environment and Local Government, Deputy Dempsey, for several years to introduce regulations for the safe disposal of vehicles to prevent them being used by joyriders to kill or maim. The motor industry should have a major share of the responsibility for the disposal of vehicles. Prior to every budget we are harassed by the Society of the Irish Motor Industry to grant it this and that in relation to tax breaks. SIMI has not dealt with its key responsibility nor have all the famous car companies. The Minister indicated in November that under an EU directive if they did not come forward with a scrappage system he would do something about it by April 2002. Under EU directives, Ireland is required to make these regulations. The Minster, Deputy Dempsey, told me early last year he was in discussions with the SIMI and his objective was to have an acceptable vehicle recovery scheme in place not later than autumn of that year but nothing happened. We continue to pursue the issue and hopefully there will be some significant action.
I have here the picture of an appallingly damaged vehicle from Cork city's north ring road. The senior garda has indicated that Garda Brian Shanahan miraculously escaped death and was flung 30 feet into the air while trying to do his duty when one of these famous company cars came speeding towards him. We almost had a third tragedy in the space of a week. The Minister for the Environment and Local Government, Deputy Dempsey, and the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform, Deputy O'Donoghue, have evaded their political responsibility.
It is no coincidence that car related crime is a major problem for the most disadvantaged areas. It has often been compared to drug related crime. It is a malign influence and is a symptom of extreme youth alienation and despair, often among kids who dropped out of the education system. In my area I noticed in recent weeks that alleged names of current miscreants are similar to the seven and eight year old tear-aways whom I remember in primary school. It was very difficult to keep them in school and the school valiantly tried to get a sin-bin with intensive teaching to hold these kids. Unfortunately, the successive Governments did not provide the resources. Journalists such as Paul Williams have made the point that some of the most serious criminals who disgraced the country in terms of drug related crime and all kinds of mayhem from the mid 1980s to the mid 1990s started as joyriding thieves. That is an important point.
The other day Jim Walsh of the Combat Poverty Agency clearly showed in a brilliant analysis that the five budgets of the Minister for Finance, Deputy McCreevy, were geared to the needs of the rich. The poorest 20% received under 5% of the last five budgets whereas the richest 10% got 25%. The conclusion he came to is that Ireland is among the most unequal countries in the EU with one of the highest rates of relative income poverty. That is the background condition of which we need to be aware. That is the reason it is crucial that major resources are put into those areas.
One problem behind this serious criminal activity is early school leaving. We had a discussion a few hours ago in the House on the huge cohort of children dropping out not only of secondary school but of primary school. On the same day the Minister for Education and Science, Deputy Woods, my constituency colleague, said all children would have to remain in school until they are 16 years of age. Each year there has been a continuing and massive fall-away, a growing gap in skills and growing alienation and despair.
The Government has paid lip service to putting resources into disadvantaged and deprived areas. I could mention many of them, but one is the RAPID programme which was set up by the Government. It did not go through Dublin City Council, county councils or the partnership boards. It set up a whole new edifice of jobs for various people but not for people on the ground. Now senior officials in national and local government say that RAPID will not and has not been implemented because no funding was provided by the Minister, Deputy McCreevy. It is against this background that we have ended up with serious crime, with car related crime being allowed to flourish. That is why the Labour Party has produced the Road Traffic (Joyriding) Bill, 2002. The Bill is the first step in a multifaceted programme. It makes joyriding a specific crime and sets out to ban the supply of company cars to under-age drivers and imposes strict penalties in terms of fines of up to €32,000. As the Minister will recall from the letter from which I quoted extensively, we intended the Bill introduced in 2000 to be one of nine major initiatives that would be taken to tackle this problem.
I hope, on this the last or penultimate day of this Dáil, that the two Ministers to whom I referred and the Taoiseach will at long last decide to establish a multi-agency task force to tackle this problem and that they will be prepared to accept this Labour Party legislation. I commend the Bill to the House. I appeal to the Minister present and to his colleague, the Minister, Deputy O'Donoghue, to accept this legislation and to act on it by adopting a multi-agency approach to tackling this problem.
My colleague, Deputy Rabbitte, did a magnificent job in the rainbow Government in putting together a raft of measures and actions to tackle drug related crime by establishing the local drugs task forces. Over the past five years we gained immensely in that area from the initiatives taken by Deputy Rabbitte when Minister of State. We need a similar initiative to address problems in areas of deprivation in particular. A start could be made in that direction tonight by the Minister accepting this Bill.