Are some guards still above the law?
Change, we are told, is blowing through the culture in An Garda Síochána. This is as a direct result of the recent oversight controversies and attitudes towards a member of the force who highlighted wrongdoing until it was finally addressed.
A commissioner has resigned. The interim commissioner has indicated that all has changed, changed utterly. This could be the enthusiasm of a new cultural broom, or it might be heard, metaphorically, as the desperate plea of the alcoholic who pledges everything will be different, once he manages to bring his drinking under control.
Last Monday, the interim commissioner, Nóirín O’Sullivan, had an opportunity to signal that meaningful change was taking place. At a passing-out parade for 100 new recruits, she could have encapsulated how she was dragging the force, perhaps kicking and screaming, into the 21st century.
On the same auspicious day for these young men and women, setting out to serve the State, a little drop of news rained on their parade.
The previous day, it had emerged that more allegations of abuse of the penalty-points system had been reported. These allegations concern senior officers and span the last two years, since the controversy first blew up.
After all the inquiries, the resignations, the pledges of change, the resolution to mend ways, even new regulations, some within the force, apparently, believe they are free to continue to act with impunity.
The interim commissioner could have seized the news and used it to acknowledge that change was difficult, but that it was being embraced. She could have addressed recruits along the following lines: “I regret that these allegations have overshadowed your big day, but, right now, we’re going through major change and that can’t happen overnight. Part of the new culture I hope to usher in will be to ensure that among members the truth will always trump loyalty to the force. That will be in your hands. If you want an example, you could do worse than look at Sergeant Maurice McCabe, the man who brought these allegations to my attention. He has proven to be right in the past, and he may well be right now. If so, we will acknowledge that some in the force are finding change very difficult and if such individuals can’t be a part of the future, your future, then they will be consigned to the past.” She could have said something like that.
Instead, she reverted to type, circling the wagons. “I do not think that (the allegations) should detract in any way from the excellent work that the men and women of An Garda Síochána do,” she said.
“It would be very unfortunate that we would jump to conclusions to suggest that the entire force are in any way responsible or ill-disciplined.”
There was no question of the entire force being ill-disciplined, just, perhaps, a number of senior officers who believed they were above the law. And, of course, none of it should take from the good work of the majority, but why use that to deflect from the issue.
Meanwhile, the line being spun through the media was that the abuses of the last two years were irrelevant. All that mattered was what had happened since June 16 last, when new regulations, confining the cancelling of points to the central office, were implemented. Once again, rather than address a problem head on, the strategy was to bury as much of it as possible.
Unfortunately, it won’t wash. If the allegations from the last two years turn out to be accurate, it is a terrible indictment of the discipline of the senior officers involved.
On publication of the ‘O’Mahoney Report’ in May, 2013, then Justice Minister Alan Shatter laid out seven principles to inform cancellation of points. If the allegations prove correct, then those principles were treated with contempt by the officers who continued to transgress.
On August 30 last year, a new directive was issued to the entire force, aimed at tightening up operation of the system. Again, some officers believed that didn’t apply to them. How can this behaviour — if it turns out to be the case — be described as anything other than entirely ill-disciplined, and bordering on out-of-control?
That attitude, far more than whether or not the system is currently operating properly, demonstrates the enormity of the task of changing the culture within the force.
So it goes in the upper echelons.
Down among the rank-and-file, there are also worrying signs that change will not be embraced without resistance.
Garda Review, the magazine published by the Garda Representative Association, launched an astonishing attack on Maurice McCabe last week. In a major article, a number of garda members, who are quoted but given pseudonyms, make allegations about the character and conduct of the man who has come to be known as the garda whistleblower.
None of these allegations are backed up by any reference to facts, but merely presented as opinion.
In one case, the opinion is offered by a member who hadn’t even worked with McCabe, and doesn’t know him personally.
All of the allegations could have easily been discounted by a cursory perusal of official records, or of the ‘Guerin Report’. Yet, instead of offering either balance or attempting to verify allegations, this organ of a garda representative organisation chose to attack a serving member whose only apparent transgression was to step outside the culture of wagon-circling.
Complimenting the article is an editorial by the GRA’s PJ Stone, who writes. “The ‘Guerin Report’ is all about the allegations one man has made, and everyone has taken it as doctrine.”
This is errant nonsense. Guerin reviewed files on the basis of statements from victims and members of the gardaí involved in the cases at issue. McCabe was interviewed because of his knowledge of these matters. Far from being untested, his allegations were put through the ringer by Guerin, and properly so.
Stone is correct that the government has inexcusably delayed setting up the commission of inquiry Guerin recommended, but the attacks on McCabe speak volumes for the attitudes, in some quarters, towards anybody who steps outside the prevailing culture.
Changing how things have been done within the force is going to be difficult. Morale is low after six years of cutbacks and early departures, and has been dealt further blows by the recent controversies. Leadership, at all levels, appears to be having difficulty in grappling with what has to be done. One way or the other, real change will have to be affected. Those new recruits, brimming with enthusiasm, deserve no less.
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