Adams says Garda needs to have ‘operational independence’

Sinn Féin leader Gerry Adams has called for the blueprint for policing followed in North Ireland after the peace process to be applied to An Garda Síochána.

Responding to the report by the Garda Inspectorate stressing the urgent need for a root-and-branch reform of the force, Mr Adams said the Patten Commission proposals, used as part of the transformation of the former RUC following the Belfast Agreement of 1998, would be good for An Garda Síochána.

“We think a more accountable, transparent policing service works for those who give huge public service in that organisation. We also think it’s good for our citizens,” he said.

Speaking in advance of a Sinn Féin ardcomhairle meeting and a training day for the party’s 18 female general election candidates in Dublin on Saturday, Mr Adams said there had been partial movement by the Government on some of the issues of reform but it had not gone far enough.

The Garda Inspectorate report, ordered by former minister for justice Alan Shatter has yet to be published, but is expected to be presented to the Cabinet next week by current Minister Frances Fitzgerald.

Details of the report were revealed in Saturday's Irish Times.

In trenchant criticism of the force the report calls for a radical overhaul to eradicate layers of management and administration and to free up 1,000 gardaí for frontline policing.

Asked how he would compare the operation of An Garda Síochána with that of the PSNI, Mr Adams said “I’m not comparing them. I’m saying you need to have a police authority that needs to be democratic. You need to take away the political patronage that used to exist over a long period.”

‘Independence’

He said “the gardaí need to have operational independence but they need to be policing with the community and the vast majority of gardaí do that. The late Tony Golden was an example in my own constituency of community policing and you find that with most gardaí throughout the State.”

He said the policing service needed to have all the accountability and transparency mechanisms. “All of the difficulties which emerged, emerged in the leadership , in the upper echelons.”

He said there had been an “almost unprecedented series of events which led to the retirement or the sacking or the resignation of the Garda commissioner, depending on how you look at it”.

It also led to the resignation of the minister for justice and of “one of the people who was put in to actually look at all of this and we still haven’t got to the bottom of the Fennelly report yet so there are huge, issues out there that need to be resolved.”

He also said working class communities “have a different experience with An Garda Síochána compared to others and there needs to be more outreach, more connection, more ownership by the public and more support by the public of the gardaí”.

Asked about media reports that families were refusing offers of social housing, Sinn Féin deputy leader Mary Lou McDonald said “let’s not get caught up in a blame game where Fine Gael and the Labour Party try to exonerate themselves from any blame by saying it’s the families own fault because they won’t accept the offers that are being made to them”

She said that was simply not true. “Eventually all of those houses are snapped up. That’s the reality.”

“I would hate any impression to be given that people are being picky or choosy or whimsical in terms of their housing need.

"Responsibility lies with Government that is Alan Kelly, Joan Burton and Enda Kenny. "

‘Vastly improve’

Tánaiste Joan Burton welcomed the report and said An Garda Síochána had to “vastly improve” and had been given the funding to start doing so as well as deal with its IT issues.

She said that in responding to the community, a properly equipped Garda force was needed. The last re-organisation in terms of Garda divisions and other elements was done quite a while ago, she said.

Ms Burton said there was merit in looking at the structure and its technology provision because the report was suggesting that with better co-ordination and better IT a lot more could be done in terms of investigation and in other areas.