Proposed changes to the Criminal Justice Bill 2004 are vague, cosmetic and would make bad law, the Irish Council for Civil Liberties has said.
the proposed Bill contains amendments to the law that are excessive Michael Finucane - ICCL
Calling for the proposed amendments to be scrapped, the ICCL said the changes could leave the State open to challenge in the courts.
In a statement issued as the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Justice, Equality, Defence and Women's Rights began considering the Bill, the ICCL criticised the Minister for Justice for introducing what it said were "substantive proposals" at the Committee stage.
ICCL called for "significant investment in Garda resources and problem-solving community policing measures" rather than the introduction of "extensive but ultimately vague and unjustified changes to the criminal justice system".
Michael Finucane, solicitor and ICCL Board member, said: "The main problem in the Irish Criminal Justice System today is that the gardaí in particular and the System in general are severely-underfunded and under-resourced.
"The measures proposed by the Minister are superficial and do nothing to address this or the root cause of many problems facing Irish society," he said.
"The Minister appears to see solutions to crime in terms of increased policing powers and creating new offences but in reality, the proposed Bill contains amendments to the law that are excessive, unnecessary and do no more than merely replicate legislative provisions that already exist. ICCL has examined the proposed amendments in detail and made a number of recommendations."
Among the measures criticised by the ICCL are provisions on organised crime, which it said included "vaguely worded" offences. It also criticised proposals to give Garda Superintendents the power to issue search warrants in certain circumstances, claiming this could be open to abuse.
The ICCL also wants the provision that saliva be reclassified as a "non-intimate" bodily sample for DNA purposes to be scrapped.