Seanad report: Minister for Justice Michael McDowell said he was confident that any lessons that needed to be learned from the violent disorder in Dublin last Saturday would be learned. Other events were due to be held soon in the city.
The happenings of Saturday indicated a risk which would have to be addressed.
Brian Hayes, Fine Gael leader in the House, said he was worried that a virulent neo-nationalism had taken hold as a result of the rise of Sinn Féin in recent years.
A vacuum had been created for many of our young people. The constitutional parties had left that vacuum, and they now needed to show leadership to remove it.
Joe O'Toole (Ind) said rather than calling for a public inquiry into the rioting, he wanted to know why such a large proportion of our population apparently thought that the march by the Northern FAIR group should not have taken place. Why had we produced generations of people who did not understand the importance of protest or the right to demonstrate. Had we not gone through an 800-year struggle to establish those rights? "We have failed as politicians to inculcate the acceptance of diversity and difference in our community."
Kathleen O'Meara (Labour) said what had been revealed last Saturday had been very, very frightening. "We can say it was a small group of thugs, as it was. But it was organised, and it was led, and we need to know that it exists in every town in Ireland."
Cyprian Brady (FF) said if anything good had come out of the riot, it might be that it had opened people's eyes as to what some of these groups were capable of.
David Norris (Ind) said he had yesterday turned down an invitation from the Taoiseach's office to attend the 1916 commemoration parade in Dublin. The riot in Dublin was a reminder of how close to the surface unsophisticated emotions, were even in our capital city. "I think it also calls into question the wisdom of holding this militaristic sabre-rattling parade on Easter Sunday. I will be attending church. As far as I am concerned Easter Sunday is about the resurrection of Jesus Christ and not the insurrection of Padraig Pearse."
Asking that the Tánaiste come to the House to say what she intended to do about a potentially-serious outbreak of TB, Shane Ross (Ind) said he had been hospitalised as a child for a long time with the illness. "A lot of people died in beds around me, particularly children."