Garda training ground to a halt, committee hears

Training in An Garda Siochana has ground to a halt to such an extent that some detectives have not been trained at all, the body charged with identifying the need for policing reform in the Republic has said.

The Garda Inspectorate said the concept of continuous professional training has ceased within the force and warn that such neglect will “come back to haunt” An Garda Siochana.

In the most critical comments from any senior member of the inspectorate since its inception eight years ago, Chief Inspector Bob Olsen told the Oireachtas Committee on Justice "there's been almost a grind to a halt" of continuous professional development.

“It’s happened over the last several years and it’s going to come back and haunt (the Garda) if it isn’t fixed. We’re running into detectives that have never had detective training.”

He also warned the Garda was many years behind police forces in other jurisdictions in terms of using technological advances to enhance how they work.

Appointed as chief inspector in 2012, Mr Olsen was also critical of the provisions of the Garda Siochana Act that governs his organisation, as well as the other elements of Garda oversight introduced in the wake of the corruption unearthed by the Morris Tribunal.

Specifically, he said the inspectorate should have been given the power to conduct inspections of areas of Garda work and procedures of its own volition, rather than taking its lead from requests by Government and the minister for justice of the day.

“For example, fixed charged penalties,” he said. “We could have started that a year before and maybe a lot of this wouldn’t have happened.”

Mr Olsen was referring to the Garda’s and Department of Justice’s handling of allegations around the termination of motorists penalty points. He made his comments before the committee yesterday as part of the process of a review now underway into the Garda Siochana Act 2005.

Also before the committee yesterday, Dr Richard O’Flaherty from Limerick outlined allegations of Garda brutality he had encountered during his work with disadvantaged people.

Dr O'Flaherty, a member of the Justice4All group , claimed in one case an elderly woman had slipped into a diabetic coma as gardaí questioned her about a relative's alleged involvement in crime. He said gardaí refused to allow her use a toilet and then refused her access to the medical treatment she obviously needed.

In another case, he alleged a 17-year-old with special needs was stripped and beaten with a belt by gardaí, saying he had photographs of the child’s injuries.

The Garda Siochana Ombudsman Commission (GSOC) has said the entire system of Garda oversight introduced after the Morris Tribunal needs to be "reset" and it believes it should be permitted to subsume the office of confidential recipient into its operations.

The extra powers now being sought by the Garda watchdog, coupled with its recently introduced unfettered access to the Garda’s PULSE data base, would usher in a radical new system under which the oversight powers of the commission over the Garda force would be total.

The GSOC wants to be able to investigate a wider range of alleged crimes and misconduct on the part of gardaí, to be able to investigate the holder of the office of Garda Commissioner currently outside its remit, to be able to probe complaints by gardai made against their colleagues and to take on the responsibilities of the confidential recipient’s office to which Garda whistleblowers can go.

The Association of Garda Sergeants and Inspectors (Agsi) said it was against GSOC subsuming the role of confidential recipient. General secretary John Redmond said he could not see his members going to an office to report concerns about the force when that office had been established to investigate complaints against them the force they belonged to.