Criminals face up to five years in prison for grooming children into life of crime

Criminals convicted of grooming children into a life of crime could face up to five years in prison under legislation expected to be approved by the Cabinet on Wednesday.

Minister for Justice Simon Harris will seek approval from his fellow Ministers for the Bill which is designed to prevent criminal networks from exploiting young people to commit offences and aims to break the link between gangs and vulnerable youths.

Mr Harris is expected to tell this morning’s Cabinet meeting that some children are being deceived by criminal networks into believing crime can bring “wealth, bling and a party lifestyle but in reality it brings debts and fear”.

The Criminal Justice (Engagement of Children in Criminal Activity) Bill 2023 was originally pushed by minister Helen McEntee, who is currently on maternity leave. It is understood that the Government plans to enact the legislation before the summer.

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The law would give An Garda Síochána the power to intervene locally to prevent offences from taking place. It will contain specific offences covering cases where an adult compels, coerces, induces or invites a child to engage in criminal activity.

Gardaí will be given additional powers in order to make such grooming a separate, prosecutable offence. There are already provisions in law where an adult who uses a child to commit a crime can generally be found guilty as the principal offender. This means they can be punished as though they had committed the crime themselves.

Separately, the Cabinet will also consider new plans to install high-powered electric vehicle chargers along the State’s main road networks, which would see such chargers being placed within every 60km stretch.

Green Party leader and Minister for the Environment Eamon Ryan is to present his colleagues with details of the strategy, which is aimed at reassuring car users of the feasibility of switching from a petrol or diesel to an electric vehicle in the coming years.

The Government is expected to approve what would be the State’s first ever electric vehicle charging infrastructure strategy, which sets out plans to deliver such infrastructure over the next three years.

It is understood that funding of €100 million will be made available and that the public charging points will be rolled out to complement home charging, which currently accounts for how the vast majority of electric vehicles are charged.

The strategy will also attempt to address issues around charging electric vehicles at houses and in apartment complexes, neighbourhood charging points, destination charging at sites such as shopping centres and hotels and options along the main roads network.

Mr Ryan is to bring a separate memo on the transport strategy for the greater Dublin area for the next 20 years, which will set out the transport planning policy for the region comprising counties Dublin, Kildare, Meath and Wicklow. It will include plans for major infrastructural projects already well flagged and under way at some level such as BusConnects, Dart+ and MetroLink.

Meanwhile, Minister for Arts, Media and Culture Catherine Martin is expected to bring forward an implementation strategy and action plan to give effect to the recommendations made in the report by the Future of Media Commission last year.

The strategy is to include a review of Irish language services across the entire media sector as well as the introduction of funding through a new media fund. Priority will be given to local democracy reporting and courts reporting schemes. There will also be commitments to progress the reform of defamation laws and a review of the operation of copyright laws.