Penalty Points: Let this be the first step to wider reforms

Do all senior garda officers read reports pertaining to how they should do their work? The release of details of an investigation into the latest abuses of the penalty points system suggests not.

Six superintendents, including an acting superintendent, were found to have acted outside prevailing policy in cancelling penalty points over the last 18 months.

This was after a report by assistant commissioner John O’Mahoney should have raised a red flag for anybody abusing the system. It was after a report by the Comptroller and Auditor General, including recommendations, about how the system was being abused. It was after a major report by the Garda Inspectorate into how the system was open to abuse. In the interim, the Garda commissioner resigned, his departure at least partly attributable to how the penalty points scandal was handled. And the departing justice minister also bore some of the burn marks from his role in the affair.