THE GARDA Síochána Ombudsman Commission is to lobby Minister for Justice Alan Shatter for a change to its procedures to allow the Garda internally resolve more minor complaints and free up the commission’s resources for serious investigations.
New commission chairman Simon O’Brien said the system of the Garda informally resolving complaints against its own members had not bedded down as well in the Republic as had been the case with police complaints procedures in other jurisdictions.
He said the manner in which the Garda Act, which provides for the commission, was framed could lead to a rigid system where members of the Garda and the public often believed they had to engage with the commission’s formal complaints procedures to resolve even minor matters.
“A lot of the complaints that we get in could be seen as customer service complaints; somebody doesn’t agree with being given a ticket for not wearing a seatbelt, someone who doesn’t get their car back from the guards on time. Is there another category under which those service complaints could be dealt?” he asked.
Mr O’Brien, a former police officer with the London Met, added that in Britain complaints that could be defined as “customer service” issues were often dealt with internally by a police officer at the rank of sergeant.
“I sense it would be something to be looked at here,” he said.
Another member of the commission, Kieran Fitzgerald, said the current system under which complaints were funnelled into the formal complaints investigation process, was often not the approach favoured by complainants.
However, he said, even if the legislation was changed to allow for more informal complaint resolutions by the Garda themselves, he did not think this would be a return to the old system where gardaí, rather than an independent body, investigated complaints about their own colleagues.
He said gardaí would still not be permitted to investigate allegations of criminal wrongdoing levelled at other gardaí. “That’s our job, we do that and we will continue to do that,” he said.
“Where, however, we think there’s a role for the guards to be involved is in resolving low-level issues of a minor disciplinary nature.” The commission is now preparing a report for Mr Shatter on a number of proposed reforms and is also finalising its five-year strategy plan.
Mr O’Brien said he was keen the commission would work closely with the Garda Inspectorate in passing on issues that arose regularly in complaints against gardaí. These “old chestnuts” could then form the basis of a wider review by the inspectorate.
The Garda Ombudsman Commission was established in 2005 to investigate complaints about gardaí. The Garda Inspectorate was established about the same time to study policing policy and make recommendations to government for improvement to the Garda.
Both agencies arose as part of the reform following the Morris tribunal’s investigation into policing in the Donegal division.
Mr O'Brien and Mr Fitzgerald were speaking to The Irish Timeson the occasion of being presented to President Higgins at Áras an Uachtaráin yesterday. Also in attendance was the third member of the commission, Carmel Foley.
The three-person commission was appointed last December when the Government approved their nominations by Mr Shatter.
Ms Foley had been a member of the previous commission and she has been reappointed for a further five-year term. Mr Fitzgerald has been head of communications and research with the commission since its inception.
Mr O'Brien comes to the commission from the Garda Inspectorate, where he was deputy chief officer. Mr Fitzgerald and Mr O'Brien replace outgoing commission members Conor Brady, a former editor of The Irish Times, and Dermot Gallagher, a former secretary general of the Department of Foreign Affairs.