If Mrs Nora Owen is in the closing weeks of her Calvary at the Department of Justice and one way or another that is very likely the case her Discussion Paper on Crime, published this morning, allows her go out on a relatively high note. It is a substantial document, marking a significant step forward in areas of public debate which have heretofore been characterised more by heat than by light.
Mrs Owen has had a rough, disaster strewn two and a half years at the Department. Only her most grudging detractors would deny that she has thrown herself energetically into her task there. But she has been vulnerable to the charge that she did little more than react to events, that she made no progress in getting ahead of the issues, that the Department's performance has been ad hoc and unfocused.
She would claim that she inherited a situation which demanded a great deal of immediate fire fighting. Serious crime appeared to run riot almost as soon as she took office, culminating in the murders of Detective Garda Jerry McCabe and journalist Veronica Guerin. And she will point to a series of practical but significant steps which have been taken under her hand the bail referendum, the prisons programme, the establishment of the Criminal Assets Bureau and so on.
Yet there has been little impression of any overall coherence in the Department's performance. Rather has there been a sense of individual elements going their own way, garnering a little here and a little there by way of resources but without any clear mandate as to what the community wants from its criminal justice system. That has been in contrast with other areas of State administration health, education, social welfare and so on which operate to quantifiable targets and identifiable objectives.
Mrs Owen's discussion paper would appear to mark the end of this "sticking plaster" culture, as she describes it herself. It is a detailed and thoughtful distillation of the crime problem and of the community's possible responses to it. It recognises the place of research in any State policy on crime and, perhaps most important of all, it confirms the Minister's stated intention to establish a permanent Crime Council which will examine all aspects of crime and crime policy along the successful model of similar councils in other EU countries.
The tragedy of the failure to get to grips with Ireland's crime problem is that the problem is, so far, of modest proportions. Our crime rates are low by international standards. But Irish people place a high value on the tranquillity and safety of their living environment and if it is destroyed they will feel a keen sense of loss. Indeed, that loss will also be felt economically for it will have a direct effect on our tourism industry and on our ability to attract inward investment.
Whoever follows Nora Owen into the Department of Justice - and whatever the composition of the coming government the development of lucid and effective policies for the criminal justice system will be a paramount objective. Mindless incrementalism - more gardai, more prisons, more technological gimmickry has too often substituted for policy in the past. Additional resources may be needed. But that alone will not be enough. An approach based on research, with coordinated objectives and clear aims is required for the future. Mrs Owen has put forward an acceptable and timely foundation for it and in doing so substantially restores her own standing as well.