Policing body stamps its authority

The new Policing Authority has announced its arrival and wasted little time in heaping more pressure on a beleaguered Garda Commissioner Nóirín O’Sullivan.

With a hard-hitting statement following its meeting with the under-fire commissioner, the authority has set its stall out in a bid to restore confidence in the force. It was scathing in its criticisms of Garda failures.

The authority voiced serious concern at the impact on victims, at the systemic performance and management failures, and dismay at the familiarity of performance failures through various inquiries and reports.

It expressed deep unease at the organisation and management culture, including the environment for speaking out.

It is also clear the authority spoke to Ms O’Sullivan about what instructions she did or did not give to her legal team in relation to how to handle whistleblower Sgt Maurice McCabe.

How Garda management treat whistleblowers and protected disclosures was also discussed.

It said there is a need for an urgent response by An Garda Síochána to the O’Higgins report’s findings and recommendations while expressing concern that good work being done by gardaí every day can be set to nought while doubts remain about these issues.

The authority has decided to haul Ms O’Sullivan before it at least two more times in June for “more detailed discussion on the issues” raised by the O’Higgins report. Most notably, the authority, headed up by the former head of the Revenue Commissioners, Josephine Fehily, expressed its serious concern at the re-occurrence of the performance failures identified by previous inquiries, including the Morris Tribunal and various Garda Inspectorate Reports, dating back almost 20 years.

Also welcome is its decision to hold those upcoming meetings in public. Ms Feehily and her fellow authority members decided that in the “interests of transparency and community confidence in the Garda Síochána”, a more detailed examination of specific issues arising from the commission report needs to take place in public and, due to its urgency and breadth, will hold two meetings in public on the June 13 and 30. Given the political interregnum and delay in forming a government, the opportunity for a public forum like the Oireachtas Justice Committee to interrogate the commissioner on the raging controversy — kicked off by reports in this paper — has been lacking. So, for the two meetings to be open to public and media scrutiny is a major development in a process bedevilled by secrecy and mystery.

Even though some TDs believe it is not truly independent because it answers to the Justice Minister Frances Fitzgerald, it is nonetheless an encouraging start for the new body.