The Dáil is Ireland's police authority - McDowell

Tánaiste Michael McDowell yesterday signalled his intention to establish a security and policing committee rather than accepting Opposition calls for a police authority.

During a special Dáil debate, Mr McDowell said that the existing Justice Committee was "overloaded" and was not the appropriate forum for direct Oireachtas accountability from the Garda.

He said that some deputies had called for a police authority to be set up. "Dáil Éireann is Ireland's police authority and account-ability through the Minister and the commissioner is the most appropriate mechanism for democratic oversight of a modern police and security service."

He said that "it is my intention to consult the Opposition parties on the establishment of a security and policing committee. If the measures in the Garda Síochána Act are to have full effect, the Committee on Justice, Equality, Defence and Women's Rights, which has a number of functions and is overloaded with other matters, is not the appropriate forum for having direct Oireachtas accountability from the Garda".

Mr McDowell was speaking as he opened a three-hour debate on the Garda and the implications for governance, accountability and discipline within the force in the wake of the publication of a number of reports including the Morris, Barr, Bermingham and Nally reports.

He said that a "veritable transformation" was taking place in the Garda. "It is not the same old force. It is a changing force in a changing Ireland."

The Government's actions, he said, had shown "unprecedented reform and a new era in policing in this country".

Fine Gael's justice spokesman Jim O'Keeffe paid tribute to the Garda and said that "through the teething of the Free State and more recently during the Troubles, gardaí have acted valiantly to secure our State and protect its citizens".

But he warned that in the wake of recent revelations everyone "will want to see a refocusing and redirection arising from these reports which will ensure the core mission is established at the centre of the Garda's approach".

Labour spokesman Brendan Howlin described the reports as "ground-breaking and profoundly important public documents, which require concerted and ongoing response from this House and from the executive".

He welcomed the ongoing investigation of Mr Justice Morris in Donegal. "At last some measures of relief and vindication are being given to citizens of this State who are subjected to unimaginable anguish and distress", and who were "abused by their own State and by its agent, An Garda Síochána".

He said that the scale of the abuse of power "beggars belief. It is both frightening and shocking that if could have continued over such a protracted period and time and that so many individual gardaí of all ranks could have been involved".

The core issue remained the establishment of a new accountable management authority for An Garda Síochána. "This authority must be independent of the Department of Justice, must approve an agreed policing plan for the country and must agree with senior Garda management on the level of resources needed for this agreed work plan."

Mr Howlin said Garda Commissioner Noel Conroy's comments that "discipline in the force was working well and that the problems outlined in relation to Garda management had been addressed", ran counter to the "profoundly worrying conclusion of Mr Justice Morris himself, when he stated that the gardaí serving in Donegal cannot be said to be unrepresentative or an aberration from the generality".