Gary Gannon
Dublin Central · Social Democrats · Ireland
“I will talk about that in a couple of minutes but before I do I want to come back to some of the things the Minister of State said in his opening speech, particularly the last paragraph.”
“It will create a scenario where vulnerable people will simply not be able to get up their street for potentially three days because there will be a multitude of different providers steaming up these streets, which were never created for such large vehicles.”
“Those things should not be in competition with each other. The remunicipalisation of waste is going to cost money. That is a simple fact, but public services often should operate at a loss.”
“He engaged with the evidence and with stakeholders and came to the same determination, namely, that what we have at present for waste management services, not only in Dublin but nationally, is no longer tolerable. It has led to a system that is clearly not efficient or not suitable for the purpose intended.”
“Does the Tánaiste recognise the scale of the chaos in our criminal justice system at the moment? Thousands of cases have been adjourned. Victims will await justice. Backlogs are building. We now have habeas corpus cases taking place in the High Court. The Minister referenced my flowery language.”
“I want to acknowledge Deputy Sherlock for her work in bringing forward this Bill. We in the Social Democrats will be supporting it. It is a shame that the Minister of State is not willing to engage further than to simply vote it down on the promise that a review will be released in an unspecified time.”
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“That is why I will be supporting this Bill, and any other proposal that forces us to move - really move - towards meaningful action for women who have endured extraordinary violence at the hands of their abusers. The truth is, and I will continue to say it on this floor, that women in Ireland are being terrorised in their homes and the State meets that terror with paperwork. Women are escaping with their children and we meet their bravery with a 12-week deadline. Women are walking into multiple courtrooms at once and we hand them the burden of stitching together a system we designed to be separate. We owe those women safety. We owe them time. We owe them a justice system that does not retraumatise. We owe them a country that refuses to become numb to their suffering.”
“The system needs to be rebuilt around victims, not around bureaucracy, tradition or the convenience of the State. It requested mandatory training for everyone - judges, gardaí, solicitors and court staff. It recommended a wraparound support system through every stage of a case. It also included changes to the in camera rule so victims can speak to the people who actually support them. This is a justice system that acts like it actually wants survivors to survive. These are not radical demands; these are the basics of a functioning, humane State. This Bill is one practical step towards that kind of system - making sure that when a court has recognised sexual violence, it can also provide real, enforceable civil protection, without sending the survivor back into another maze of separate proceedings or putting their life in danger.”
“Survivors of domestic and sexual violence in Ireland must navigate three separate legal systems - criminal, family, and child protection. These systems do not speak to each other. They do not acknowledge each other’s decisions. They place the entire burden of communication on the victim. Imagine giving evidence in a criminal trial against the man who hurt you, who attempted to destroy you, and the very same day trying to negotiate access arrangements in a civil court where none of that evidence is automatically recognised. Imagine being expected to be your own case manager for the State, carrying trauma between jurisdictions because the system does not seem bothered to connect itself. Ellen O’Malley-Dunlop, one of the report’s authors, put it even more clearly.”
“Right now, even where a court finds that an offence of sexual violence has been committed, the person who has lived through that abuse can still be left to navigate separate legal processes to secure ongoing protection. This Bill recognises that gap and seeks to close it. It creates a legal route for the courts, once they have found that an offence of sexual violence has been committed under our sexual offences and trafficking laws, or the common law offence of rape, to grant a civil protection order for the complainant. It says that when the courts recognise the harm, they should also be empowered, there and then, to put a protective barrier in place for the person who has been harmed. A report by the National Women’s Council last year, a report funded by the Department of Justice itself, laid out a brutal truth.”
“They do not have the luxury of moving on and enjoying the rest of their lives; instead they are fighting to make sure the next woman - and they know there will be a next woman - escaping her home is not abandoned after three months. That is a State-created desperation. Women who have had to survive so much are trying to endure just that little bit more so that women who come after them do not have to. That is where the Bill before us today meets the reality outside these walls, not just for women who have experienced sexual violence, but all kinds of violence. The truth is that the justice system is not working for survivors. It is not working in the courts, in the timelines, in the accommodations or in the culture that we have created in our country.”
“Only recently, I raised with the Minister the experience of a group of extraordinary survivors who came to the audiovisual room to tell us about their time in domestic violence refuges. These women had been terrorised, controlled, beaten and isolated - women who survived because they had been given the time and space to heal. Why were they here two weeks ago? They are fighting cuts to refuge accommodation. Women are now being told they get 12 weeks - 12 weeks - to rebuild their life. I found it genuinely horrifying, and I know colleagues here did as well, that women who have already survived more than most of us could ever imagine are forced to come into our Parliament to plead for the bare minimum for those who will come after them.”
“I say this with no exaggeration - the courts are absolutely heaving with cases like this. You can sit in any courtroom any day of the week and you will find men before the courts for acts of violence that should stop a country in its tracks, but they do not anymore. We have become so used to reading these stories that we simply absorb them and move on as if we just expect stories like this to come on after weather reports and as if this level of violence is the natural order of things. It is not normal. It should never be seen as acceptable. What is also not acceptable is how hard this country makes it for women to escape abuse. The walls are closing in on them tighter and tighter.”
“I do not mean just in the policies or the funding gaps, but in the national numbness that has settled around us. A numbness that lets us accept the unacceptable, every single day. I decided to do a quick skim through the headlines of today's newspapers - not any real research, just a glance. Straight away, three cases of the most extraordinary, sickening violence perpetrated against women were in the headlines. One woman was set alight after being doused in petrol in a morning attack at a Dublin house. A woman in Leixlip was seriously injured after being assaulted by her ex-partner, who then set fire to her home before taking his own life. A 55-year-old man was found guilty of murdering his 75-year-old mother by strangling her in her own home. These are headlines in our newspapers in the last 24 hours.”
“I begin by acknowledging the presence of all those in the Visitors Gallery. They are all very welcome. I thank Deputy Carthy and Sinn Féin for bringing Victims of Sexual Violence Civil Protection Orders Bill 2025. It is fitting that we are discussing it on the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women. I also acknowledge every woman who has survived domestic, sexual or gender-based violence who has ever had to walk into these halls and ask the State to care. They should not have had to do that, and it is unfortunate that so many still do. That in itself tells a story about the country we are for survivors of abuse. There continues to be something deeply wrong in how we respond to violence against women in Ireland.”
“Under Standing Order 35(3), I wish to move an amendment to the Order of Business for Thursday's afternoon session, that we have statements on the changes to immigration brought forward by the Minister for Justice, Migration and Home Affairs, which are quite significant. When we respond, as we should, we are often told we are shutting down debate. We would like to have a debate this week on the Minister's changes to the immigration system so that we can get-----”
“The north inner-city task force has been well funded - I admit that - but we still have the same lack of facilities, meaning these sporting heroes have to travel outside of their own communities. There are very few places in the country where people have to travel outside of their own communities when they are starting off in the sport for which they will reach such acclaim. The Taoiseach should address that from his office.”
“The Taoiseach's office oversees the north inner-city task force in Dublin. I imagine this week he was as proud as anyone else in the country when a young man from the north inner city captured the nation's heart by scoring two goals against Portugal and three against Hungary, namely, Troy Parrott. Whenever we have these heroes from the north inner city – I assure the Taoiseach we have many of them - inevitably, the conversation turns to the lack of facilities. Once again, when we talk about soccer, there are no football or AstroTurf pitches in the north inner city. When it was Kellie Harrington, there were no boxing facilities that were well funded by the State.”
“Many of us in this Chamber had the privilege of working with young people, whether in youth work or other areas. I was fortunate in a previous life to work in the Trinity access programme, developing leadership programmes in transition year schools all across Dublin. When I went to schools, I talked to young people about leadership and the leaders they admired, and brought that down to where they see a leadership contribution in their own lives. The conversations that come back are truly incredible. You walk into a school and you come out having learned so much yourself. It is the young people who want to talk about local infrastructure or the care they have to provide to older loved ones. They talk about where they have been failed or assisted.”
“We are not asking for anything radical. We are simply asking for an extension of the franchise. The argument is always made that those paying tax should have representation, as Deputy Heneghan said. This is more about letting good ideas flow. Let us stand for election, talk to the young people who are impacted by decisions we make in this Chamber and simply say that we trust them to decide whether they are going to vote for us or not. That is simply what this is about. The arguments have been made and have been won. Deputy Murphy had a Bill that was passed. Deputy Malcolm Byrne had a Seanad Bill in 2023 that was timed out for a year. Let us just get on with it. This is not just about young people who pay tax; it is about young people who have ideas.”
“Surely, the idea of allowing the Bill to progress to Committee Stage in order that we could look at the evidence and explore the arguments that are being presented from all sides would further empower this Chamber, not to mention empowering the young people we wish to give the vote to. It is strange that we would have Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael politicians one week telling us they no longer want to see faceless bureaucrats making decisions and, at the same time, we are told we need to wait because the Electoral Commission has not finished its work. I can appreciate that this work will look to the evidence that has already been referred to by Members across the Chamber. Surely we can demonstrate the courage of our own convictions and stand for a principle that Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael have held for the past two weeks.”
“I commend Deputy Farrelly on bringing forward the Bill and on the work he has put into it. Deputy Farrelly has dedicated a lot of his life to youth work and youth empowerment, and that shines through in the work he brings to Dáil Éireann every week. In relation to the timed amendment, the idea does not carry much weight for me any more. Deputy Byrne referred to John Collison. Following an article by Mr. Collison a couple of weeks ago, we were told that decisions should no longer be made by bureaucrats and that this is a Chamber that should make decisions. Then, the Government tells us that we need to wait for the Electoral Commission to come back to us.”
“I was not aware of the school but once you become conscious of it you cannot but commit yourself to trying to make it better. I hope the Department officials who have met the school staff in the last couple of days will also take that on board. I thank the Minister of State for her contribution.”
“Without the proper interventions that are simply being asked for by this school, the issues become far more complex and the challenges become more profound. I really think it is these locations that we must flood with supports. The idea that these 36 children were having supports removed from them because of the complex nature of their emotional and regulatory functions was so eye-opening for me. I really appreciate the fact that the Department has now met with the school. I hope schools such as Casa Caterina are prioritised rather than almost devalued or demoted based on the complexity of the issues they face every day. I bring this to the Chamber because I was definitely shocked by what I discovered there. There are amazing staff and incredible kids but a genuine lack of State intervention.”
“I am really happy to hear that a meeting has taken place between the Department and the school, Casa Caterina. It is incredible. I walked into that school about a month ago and, to my own shame and detriment, I did not actually know the school existed. Then I walked up to the shut gates. They open up and you are initially met by the kids who are playing in the playground. Who you meet are 36 children for whom mainstream education was very clearly not built. You see they had to remove themselves from the supports of DEIS and then are placed in an environment where there is so much care among the staff and so much general goodwill. You just see, in that instance, the absence of State intervention, which I thought was a real shame. These 36 young people who were failed by our education system will also become 36 adults.”
“The children and staff of Casa Caterina will be visiting the Dáil in two weeks' time. They will walk through the gates of Leinster House and see the very place that has the power to change their futures. Will the Minister of State meet with Casa Caterina leaders and listen to what they need? Will she provide the specialist staff and therapeutic supports that should have been in place from day one? Will she recognise the school for what it is, namely, a blueprint for how the State should be treating its most vulnerable children but one that is operating without dignity, without the associated expertise that is required, and without the care and interventions of the State they sorely lack?”
“The staff at Casa Caterina, under the leadership of acting principal, Lorna Cahill, and acting deputy principal Edel Troy, have done everything in their power. They are crying out for better supports, not for themselves but for the children they very clearly love and fight for every day. They are pleading for a fit-for purpose building, a multidisciplinary team consisting of mental health supports, and recognition that this school is not like every school and cannot be funded like one. No teacher, no SNA and no human could sustain this without urgent change. The Education Act 1998, guarantees every child the right to an appropriate education, and that right is very clearly being denied by neglect, by inaction and by refusing to treat schools such as Casa Caterina as the specialised settings they are.”
“These are children who have really complex needs, incredible potential and an urgent right for proper supports. Even more appalling is that many of these children come from DEIS schools and, when they move to Casa Caterina, they lose their DEIS supports. They lose the home school community liaison officer, access to school completion programmes and the essential wraparound services that are proven to keep children engaged and safe. If the Minister of State can imagine for a second, so complex are the needs of the children who are in Casa Caterina that they are not suitable for a DEIS programme school. Their vulnerabilities are so complex and their needs so great that they are not suitable for the DEIS environment but they are placed in a school that loses all associated supports.”
“However, they are doing so without the vital supports they need to do the job effectively and what the children in that school deserve. To put it plainly, we have a special school with absolutely no specialised interventions. There are no behavioural therapists, no psychologists, no play or music therapy, no social care workers and no multidisciplinary team. What they have in the school is just a handful of very brilliant teachers and SNAs who are, at this point and every single day, stretched beyond reason while doing their best to hold it together in an environment that is immensely challenging. Casa Caterina is one of only a handful of schools in Ireland for children with severe emotional and behavioural difficulties, often alongside a diagnosis of autism and ADHD. The school is stretched to its limits.”
“Urgent and deeply troubling concerns have been brought to me by the staff of Casa Caterina special school in Cabra, a school that provides critical education and care for children with severe emotional and behavioural difficulties. I understand the Minister of State is stepping in tonight for the Minister of State with responsibility for special education. I feel that this issue is also directly related to the Minister of State's own brief. Casa Caterina is not just a school. It is a lifeline that serves 36 of the most vulnerable children in this State. These are children who have been removed from mainstream settings and placed in the care of a staff who are doing everything humanely possible to provide stability, dignity and to provide education to this cohort of young students.”
“If we get the court culture right and provide alternatives to prisons across Ireland, that could make things a lot better. I welcome the Bill.”
“We need a re-investment in the Probation Service, sentencing guidelines and a judicial bench book that includes community and non-custodial sanctions and joint training between the Judiciary, Probation Service and restorative justice providers. The difference between community or custody is about whether our courts become a conveyor belt into overcrowded prisons or a place that genuinely gives people the tools to change. A short prison sentence may satisfy the demand for punishment but rarely serves the public interest in the long term; community sanctions, when properly understood and resourced, are infinitely better. We have talked quite a bit about recidivism rates which are extraordinarily high even by European standards.”
“The latest report from Restorative Justice shows that referrals to restorative programmes increased in 2024 and provision expanded to new counties, which should be welcomed, but there are still counties that have no specialist restorative provider. Most victims are never even offered to choice to take part and the vast majority of Garda cautions remain non-restorative in nature. The progress is real but it is still limited and very localised. If we are appointing new judges, this is the moment to reshape the judicial culture to ensure rehabilitation and restorative approaches are seen not as a leniency but as justice done well.”
“We were then told those innovations are not available elsewhere. That is a real omission and something we should look to rectify. Another study for the Judicial Council by SETU reached the same conclusion that judges need sentencing guidelines on non-custodial sanctions, better training on alternatives to custody and a major reinvestment in the Probation Service to provide pre-sanction reports and community projects in every part of the country. Those are not radical ideas; they are practical, evidence-based solutions to ensure we do not keep using short-term prison sentences that in fact achieve very little. Judges in every court should have the tools, training and information to see probation and community sanctions not as letting someone off but as a structured, supervised path out of reoffending. I acknowledge there has been progress.”
“It is an indictment of the lack of feedback, judicial education and resources around community sanctions. That same excellent piece of research highlighted that almost half of District Court judges do not have a probation officer regularly sitting in their court, and just as many lack access to community service suitability reports. It recommended that all courts should have access to community service suitability reports without delay and same-day reports and pre-sanction assessments should be available to every judge in every district. That is a simple, powerful reform that would make many more community sentences a real option instead of an aspiration. At the justice committee meeting this week, we heard about some of the innovations that take places in the specialist Children Court in Dublin.”
“What it found is incredibly instructive for our work here. Judges, particularly outside of Dublin, continue to rely on short custodial sentences, of less than 12 months, even though every piece of evidence tells us they do nothing to reduce reoffending. Many judges interviewed admitted they had little information about how community service works in practice - for instance, about completion rates, programme quality or supports for people with addiction or mental health issues. One judge who was interviewed for the research said plainly that they would love to know how community service is analysed, which courses are rehabilitative, and which are suitable for people with addiction or mental health issues. This is absolutely not intended to be a criticism of judges - far from it.”
“I thank the Minister for bringing forward the Bill. It is a technical one that tidies up provisions across our courts and civil law system, and we will, of course, be supporting it. However, I want to use the opportunity, when we have a Bill that is to do with the appointment of more judges, to talk not about the structures of the courts but about the culture that exists within them, particularly when it comes to sentencing and rehabilitation. If we are serious about justice and the administration of it in this country, we have to be honest about the fact that they are still far too slow to use community-based alternatives that actually work. Last year, South East Technological University, in research commissioned by the Department of Justice, examined how judges view community service orders.”
“I consistently hear the Minister of State talking absolute drivel and I do not interrupt him. So, who are we actually taking out of sectors? Is it students? Regardless of who is taken out, that will prove another area where this Government has failed. Removing students would actually destroy the education sector. Does it want to take people out of the healthcare system? Where is it? Migration pressures are undermining public confidence is another argument that is made, but public confidence has been undermined by a Government which does not have the capacity to manage anywhere across the State.”
“I am sorry that the Minister of State, Deputy Higgins, just left the Chamber because she put out a strong press release talking about the fact that we need migration in this country because we are operating at such low levels of unemployment. However, the Tánaiste did not say that. He just simply said that migration at all levels is too high, whistling a little bit for somebody to hear, but when you break it down-----”
“However, when the Minister and the Minister of State were in that room deciding this policy without any evidence, did they consider that these working people might also have childcare and afterschool needs? They might want to put themselves in a position where they could save for the deposit for rent to try get some accommodation in a failed housing market that they did not create but are now being blamed for. The Tánaiste went on to say that migration outside asylum is also too high. Here is where the hypocrisy really shows. In 2024, the Government issued 38,189 employment permits, the highest number ever with over 32,000 new permits and 5,700 renewals.”
“That was outlined as if both of them sat down and came to this determination just by themselves in a room presumably without any evidence basis or business case. Even the Government's own memo on this policy tells us it will cost €1.6 million to set it up and deliver a low-rate return. It even admits major difficulties in enforcement and recovery. There is no evidence of contribution models with high compliance rates in any EU member state. It just weakens one of the pull factors attracting international protection applicants to Ireland. This is the performative cruelty idea that people present as reasonable. Of course, perhaps the people in a position to pay could do so.”
“Detention already exists under section 5 of the Immigration Act 1999. It allows for detention for up to 56 days extendable only by court order. We have detentions in prisons at the moment but our prison system is operating at 124% capacity. Is Fine Gael, the party of law and order, telling us that those people with outstanding deportations hanging over them should go into the prison system to increase that percentage? Will we see what we saw for example in Limerick last year when people who had committed actual crimes were released from prison so that we could detain people who had committed no crime? That is the extent of what the Tánaiste said. These are the debates we need to go into. Both the Minister and the Minister of State said today that these those who work and are living in centres should pay for their accommodation.”
“The presidential election was fought over who was more pro- or less pro-European Union. If that is what is being complained about, we have signed up to international agreements and if you want to deconstruct them, maybe you should revisit your belief system. Through parliamentary questions the Minister has also confirmed that of that number of 80% at least one in three is successful on appeal. The Minister is referring to 80% but one in three people of that percentage are successful on appeal. What does that tell us? There is a red flag. It is the first-instance system that is wrong hundreds of times a year. That is not efficiency; that is failure. The Tánaiste went on to say that people who fail to comply with deportation orders should be "detained". Here again the Tánaiste sells drama instead of facts.”
“That is a net migration of 59,700, which should be a perfectly manageable number for a country of 5.46 million people. What is more, half of those arrivals were aged between 25 and 44, who are working-age adults filling vital gaps in the labour market. When the Tánaiste said that numbers are too high, he is not describing reality. He is trying to turn a story of economic growth and workforce needs into one of threat and crisis potentially because his back is against the wall. The Minister, Tánaiste and several others have said that 80% of asylum applications are rejected. The Minister stopped in his tracks to say that should be something we consider. Okay, let us consider it. People have a right to seek asylum. It is natural many of them will not be successful. That is okay. People have that right. We do not get to control that.”
“That is the issue here because far-right actors and, believe me, there are far-right actors, do not win when they get the type of people who would like to see impositions of power. They do not win electoral seats. They win when nice middle-class people, with nice respectable-looking suits, start wearing their clothes and echoing their calls. That is when they win and that is what we are seeing too often. The Tánaiste said, "migration numbers are too high". This line is everywhere. It is in interviews, briefings and even Cabinet notes but it does not stand up to a single piece of data. The Central Statistics Office tells us that immigration to Ireland actually fell by 16% in the year to April 2025. A total of 125,000 people came to Ireland and 65,000 people left.”
“We just understand the stakes and that it needs to be facts-based when we debate. The Tánaiste said that those of us who advocate for compassion, fairness and a facts-based discussion, are trying to shut down debate. What he actually means is we are refusing to nod along to misinformation. There has been no shortage of debate, be it in the media, the House or the committee chamber. We looked at the international protection Bill 2025 for over seven hours without much in the way of Government contribution, and nothing in the way of actual scrutiny, because the heads of Bill are still not even in place for most of the outstanding issues. When the Tánaiste says the debate is being shut down, he is not defending free speech. He is defending poor speech, speech that confuses facts, blames the wrong people and hides his own failures.”
“From the beginning of my tenure as Minister [for justice], applications for asylum have decreased by [approximately] 40%." Is the Minister seriously trying to tell me that because he tweets about deportation flights, somebody in some far-off location, who is considering coming here to seek asylum, will say that the Minister has now tweeted so they will not come here? He should pull the other one because it is just a joke that continues to be allowed to percolate. I will talk a little bit about the Tánaiste's comments. As I engage with this debate, because we want it to be reasonable and have asked for it to be facts-based, we should use the Tánaiste's own lines and words and deconstruct them as we go. He said that people on the left are trying to shut down the debate. That is far from the case.”
“I will talk about the comments made by the Minister, Deputy Jim O'Callaghan. There were a couple of inaccuracies in his statement. The Minister told the House that the appeals process is getting faster but his own Department gave me a response to a parliamentary question that shows that is not the case. In fact, it is the opposite. The median waiting time has increased from ten months to nearly 13 months this year, up to the end of September. The Minister is saying one thing but the opposite is true. He also made a charge that has been repeated by any number of Government backbenchers and that Ministers have taken to the media over the last six months: "My overall strategy for the international protection process, aimed at making more and faster decisions, is working.”
“I cannot imagine the mental gymnastics it would take for people to see in that incident a motivation to assault gardaí and burn fires in the hope of getting into a building, where more children were being terrified to the point where many could not get to school. That is the context in which we are having this debate. The tensions, level of rage and misdirection of anger towards migrants are all palpable. When we have a debate, and use our position and voice, it is incumbent on us to do so in a tone that is measured, with facts that are accurate, and to understand that the message we may intend to set out can often be redirected, manipulated and misconstrued by actors who are very purposely trying to set terror in the hearts of people who came here in search of sanctuary.”
“I completely welcome the debate. I am conscious it could be happening in a very different context, given how fortunate we were that the horrors we saw too viscerally in Drogheda last week did not materialise in an outcome that would have been most devastating with a loss of life. It was a scenario, however, where a person with hatred in their soul placed petrol on stairs. You cannot imagine any other outcome was intended but death and loss of life that would have included children and a baby of just 20 days. I am also conscious of the experience of a child who was viciously assaulted in Citywest a couple of weeks ago. All of us shook with absolute horror and revulsion at the failures of the State that led to that incident.”
“This is a really welcome debate and I am very interested in hearing the viewpoints of people across the Chamber. The work of the committee is ongoing. We are hearing some incredible stories that are empowering and heartbreaking. The stories we have been replicating for four decades of failed policy not only in this jurisdiction but elsewhere. At the end, we can have a document that contains evidence, reason and the heart of people who have given of their time to appear before the committee. I believe it should be respected. We need a new approach. Nobody is underestimating the task but every single day, lives are being eroded because of what is often the self-medication of trauma, poverty, harm and hurt. If we get this right, we can get it right for the next four to five decades.”
“It wastes Garda time; fills our prisons with people who need healthcare, not punishment; stigmatises people who are already struggling; and traps them in cycles of poverty and exclusion. The evidence is overwhelming. Decriminalisation does not increase use, does not empower dealers and does not erode communities. What it does is save lives, restore dignity and bring honesty back into our drug policy. If the Government truly believes in a health-led response, it must prove it. For me, that starts with the repeal of section 3. It would designate the national drugs strategy as interim, listen to participants of the citizens' assembly, fund harm reduction services properly and most of all, bring the voices of people with lived experience into every decision we make.”
“It took nearly a decade to open a single medically supervised injection centre - a decade. Now, almost a year after opening, we are seeing how effective it can be. In just seven months, it has taken thousands of injection events off the street, has saved lives and is preserving people's self-respect. In the absence of safe injection facilities, what we had for over 40 decades in this country was unsafe injection facilities in our laneways and parks. These have left the user incredibly unsafe but they also leave all of us unsafe. That is what a health-led response looks like in practice - not rhetoric, results. We should be scaling that up, not patting ourselves on the back for opening one facility a decade late. The criminalisation of people who use drugs is one of the greatest policy failures of modern Ireland.”
“The Committee on Drugs Use, of which I am incredibly proud to be the Cathaoirleach, is still doing the hard, detailed work of building a policy that reflects the evidence and the voices of people living in this reality every single day. To push ahead with a final strategy before that report is complete would be to bypass democracy entirely. We owe it to the people who have come before that committee - the experts, workers, families and most importantly the people with lived experience - to get this right. We must ensure that their voice, when they came to a committee established by this Government, is actually catered for in the work it charged the committee to do. It is essential that it is an interim strategy. We are clearly nowhere near where we should be.”
“Those resources could be redirected to addiction services, outreach, housing and harm reduction. That is what Portugal did. Multiple UN bodies have urged us to do this. It is what the Citizens' Assembly thought it was voting for, until a flawed process left decriminalisation off the ballot entirely. The chair of the assembly has been crystal clear. Members wanted decriminalisation and voted for decriminalisation. The only reason it did not appear that way on paper was how the question was written. We have an opportunity now to finish the job they started and to respect the democratic process that this Government says it values. That is why I will keep calling for the national drugs strategy to be designated as an interim strategy.”
“If somebody were to leave the Chamber now and buy a bottle of alcohol, the possession of that alcohol is not illegal. If they walked into St. Stephen's Green and opened the alcohol, it would be illegal under the council by-laws. If they consumed the alcohol and their behaviour became erratic, that would fall under the intoxication Act. We have mechanisms in our jurisdiction that would be suited to decriminalisation without the free-for-all that has been referred to. The removal of section 3 and innovative practices within the Irish model are there, have been argued for and would suit our Republic really well. Repealing section 3 would not legalise drugs. It would simply stop the State from wasting Garda and court time and prison resources chasing people for small amounts.”