Commissioner's powers expanded to include summary dismissal

New regulations: The Garda Commissioner will have the power to dismiss summarily a member of the force or can reserve judgment until a panel of senior officers hears the case, under new regulations presented by Minister for Justice Michael McDowell.

The process of dismissal will be streamlined to avoid cases taking many months, and in some cases years, to conclude. Besides this, the commissioner can appoint a three-member board of senior officers to conduct a disciplinary hearing on his behalf. On receiving the report from such a hearing, the commissioner has a range of sanction options open to him, up to and including dismissal.

He can also dismiss a member on considering a report into a serious breach of discipline from a lone officer appointed by him to examine such a case. Provisions relating to the suspension of members by the commissioner can be extended to an officer at or above the rank of chief superintendent.

These officers can suspend a member for a maximum of 10 days. But a suspension issued by the commissioner can last for an indefinite period.

Members can be suspended if they commit a criminal offence or if they are about to become the subject of a disciplinary action.

The new regulations followed "well-established principles" in the private and public sector and were significantly more streamlined than existing regulations, Mr McDowell said.

"[They] will, I believe, provide the commissioner with an internal mechanism to deal swiftly with members who sully the good name of An Garda Síochána, let down their colleagues and do a gross disservice to the State."

The Morris tribunal's Ardara report, published yesterday, had recommended that a mechanism be put in place whereby a serving member could speak in confidence to a designated officer in Garda Headquarters on concerns about misconduct within the service.

Mr McDowell said on his instructions a whistleblower's charter had been drawn up and was being finalised.

He agreed with Mr Justice Frederick Morris that disciplinary hearings within the force had developed the complexity and formality of a murder trial.

He believed the new draft regulations would modernise procedures and strengthened the hand of senior officers to move against those whose actions made them unsuitable for the Garda.

"The new regulations are designed to have summary, realistic and modern procedures put in place, the kind of things that any organisation . . . would be obliged to do, instead of a full-blown criminal justice-type process which at the moment is the order of the day in An Garda Síochána," Mr McDowell said.

Mr Justice Morris had strongly outlined the need for such a new system.

Mr McDowell would now bring his draft regulations to the representative associations in the Garda conciliation and arbitration council, the industrial relations forum for Garda matters. He expected them to be in place within months.

"This new approach to discipline within the force will take effect," he said.

"And anybody who thinks out there that they will abuse either legal or disciplinary processes to protect those who are not serving and who are betraying their vocation to the Irish people as members of An Garda Síochána; all I'm saying is they better think again."