The war on crime - There can only be one winner

ANYONE who cares for the future of this society must hope that measures announced yesterday by Justice Minister Frances Fitzgerald to try to end Dublin’s gang war succeed. However, that hope cannot ignore reality or pretend that any one set of measures will end the carnage that has cost at least seven lives since September.

The first concern is that an organisation struggling to retain credibility and led by a management structure — and entrenched culture — indicted by objective report after objective report must be front and centre of this initiative. At a moment when its stock is at a particularly low ebb, An Garda Síochána will welcome extra resources for this pressing challenge, but there are issues other than resources in play.

This is confirmed by advice offered by senior civil servants when they recently briefed Minister for Public Expenditure Paschal Donohoe. The civil servants cautioned against allocating further resources unless management introduces “a far-reaching reform programme ... An Garda Síochána need to address poor management”. The officials warn that if more resources are promised, “without demanding the type of change that all other modern police forces have been through, it will serve only to ingrain further those practices”.

It seems that the need to be seen to be doing something, almost anything, to confront the growing power of drug lords pulling the strings in this nasty bloodletting, means that more money will be thrown at a long-running problem, one that must be resolved if our police force is to become what the majority of its members want, and this society needs. It should be possible to strengthen the hand of the gardaí and, in parallel, drive overdue reform. Failure to do that will exacerbate the problem and further weaken the gardaí. That would also ensure that the next crisis provokes yet another sticking-plaster response. An essential first step would be to pay garda recruits a wage that reflects what society expects of them. The current scale undermines the force, and shows little or no respect for the idealism or motivations needed to be a good police officer.

Another issue is the shortage of prison spaces. Our jails are bursting at the seams, yet plans to build prisons are on hold. This may reflect today’s social thinking and economic reality but it is an undeniable weakness in our anti-crime armoury.

All over the world, law enforcement agencies, many very well-resourced, are confronting violence driven by illegal drug-dealing. Unfortunately, very few achieve even a reassuring degree of success. Has the time come to think the once-unthinkable, and consider legalising some drugs? That move, it seems on the surface at least, would have a far greater impact on drug cartels than those announced yesterday.

In an ideal world, any extra resources committed to policing a community would be matched by extra resources for education and creating the kind of opportunities that might break what seems an almost endless cycle of despair and marginalisation. Despite those misgivings, which are probably shared by gardaí and politicians, it is important that the tide is turned and that the forces of law and order prevail.