Dáil prepares for long summer break thanks to building work

Good morning.

Looking forward to your summer holidays? Going anywhere nice?

For TDs, the usual pitter-patter of the smallest talk about summer plans can begin in earnest today, and deputies are eyeing up a 12-week break from the Dáil chamber.

The Fine Gael parliamentary party was told last night that the Dáil will rise on July 7th and is unlikely to return until late September due to refurbishment works taking place in Leinster House.

The Dáil, in recent years, has risen in late July and returned around the first week in September so summer 2016 is shaping up as a particularly nice one for TDs.

Of course, in this era of new politics the Government cannot just have its way so Micheál Martin last night declared that he felt the proposed break was too long.Opposition parties usually raise half-hearted protests about the length of Dáil holidays, and Enda Kenny once called their bluff years ago by declaring the House would sit one extra week, as the Opposition had wished.

Government chief whip Regina Doherty was last night keen to stress that committees will continue to sit when the Dáil has risen and insisted the schedule is being entirely dictated by the works in Leinster House.

But Martin is not having a bar of it and said he had been led to believe the House would rise on July 18th. He is to raise the matter with other parties in the Dáil, but you can bet that many - including in the media - hope he is not successful in his endeavours, particularly after a gruelling election and government-formation saga.

Fianna Fáil, of course, would never have taken such a lengthy break, especially not when Bertie Ahern was leader. Oh no.

Ongoing blues

Martin was speaking as he entered the Fianna Fáil event to commemorate the centenary of the Rising, as well as the 90th anniversary of the foundation of his party that took place in the Round Room of the Mansion House last night.

Asked about the position of Garda Commissioner Nóirín O’Sullivan, Martin said she had his support and confidence, adding that it is time to move on from the O’Higgins report to focus on gangland crime.

Although the political steam seems to be going out of the O'Higgins report fallout, O'Sullivan will be questioned about it at a meeting of the Policing Authority today as Pat Leahy reports in our lead story.

The political pressure on the issue of gangland crime, however, continues. "Who's in charge?" the lead story in the Irish Independent asks, with Kevin Doyle and Paul Williams writing that "the ability of the State to deal with the threat posed to society by vicious criminals is in question after Taoiseach Enda Kenny has indicated it could take years to combat the gangland crisis".

In The Irish Times, Conor Lally reports that the man who presented himself to gardaí after the murder of Gareth Hutch this week did so because he feared his life was in danger.

Lally also asks former members of the force what can be done to stop the spiral of killing.Kitty Holland reports from Dublin's north inner city, which our leader describes as "the geographical equivalent of a second-class citizen".

While there are calls for extra resources to tackle those behind the Kinahan-Hutch feud, even those on the Opposition benches with knowledge of the north inner city yesterday privately acknowledged that the gardaí say they have enough money to do their jobs.

Resources, perhaps in overtime for gardaí to saturate the north inner city, could be increased, but the problems go deeper.

There is something of a political consensus emerging that more needs to be done than just throwing cash at the situation, and that the solution needs to tackle the deep-rooted, longer-term societal problems in the area.

One TD said measures like the equivalent Young Ballymun initiative - a ten-year intervention strategy to improve education, health and mental health for children in Ballymun - is needed.

Perhaps helping the north inner city will become the first major test of this new era of co-operative politics.