Inspectorate criticises child-sex investigations

The Policing Authority is to question acting garda commissioner Dónall Ó Cualáin and his senior team about the Garda Inspectorate report on child-abuse investigations.

This will occur at their next public meeting, in April, which will address the wider issue of children and policing, and the inspectorate’s report will now form part of that. It will be a fresh test for the acting commissioner, who, along with his senior management, was criticised at the public meeting this month, for supplying a key report to the authority, the night before, even though it was to be discussed.

That report — on the policing of the Jobstown anti-water charge protest — had been completed the previous October. The 256-page Garda Inspectorate report, published on Tuesday, highlighted a range of issues that it had concerns about.