Over the weekend, Michael O’Toole of the Irish Daily Star – a reporter with some of the best garda sources in the country – raised an important point about the policing of the rioting in Dublin that took place last Thursday: Some Gardai, he noted, simply did not know how much force they could use in order to police the capital, and many members of the force feel as if GSOC – the Garda Siochána Ombudsman Commission – would be looking over their shoulder if they had used the same amount of force that, say, Caio Benicio and Warren Donohoe did in subduing the attacker last Thursday morning:
I’ve had more than a few guards tell me this. Some people will undoubtedly disagree, but that’s grand, I think it’s important you know what they’re thinking.
They genuinely applauded the Brazilian hero Caio Benicio for smacking the knife attacker hard with his helmet, but they…
— Michael O’Toole (@mickthehack) November 25, 2023
This was followed up by a statement from the Association of Garda Sergeants in Ireland, essentially confirming that members of the force are unsure about their authority to use force:
2/2 we provided constructive feedback on a number of areas including Operational Tactics & Welfare..we also discussed concerns raised by our members that there is a fear amongst Gardai to use proportional force because of excessive Oversight…this was echoed by other Associations
— AGSI (@AGSI_Ireland) November 25, 2023
Yesterday, then, came the following intervention from the Minister for Justice. See if you can spot the strange thing about it:
Members of An Garda Síochána need to have “absolute clarity” on what levels of force they can use when faced with rioting of the sort that took place in Dublin on Thursday night so they are not “looking over their shoulders,” the Minister for Justice has said.
Helen McEntee said on Tuesday morning gardaí are authorised to use force where it is appropriate but she would be asking the Policing Authority to provide greater clarity on the levels permitted in given situations as to provide reassurance to members of the force.
“I don’t want members of An Garda Síochána looking over their shoulders responding to these incidents where they feel that force is necessary,” said the Minister. “I want them to have the confidence to respond in the way that they deem appropriate.
“So I am asking the authority to provide that clarity for members of An Garda Síochána so they do not feel that they are operating with their hands behind their backs.
Once again, the Minister for Justice – like many of her Government colleagues – is outsourcing and offloading an important matter of public interest to an unelected body rather than simply making the decision herself.
This is an important point: You, as a voter, did not elect the Policing Authority, and it does not answer to you. You did elect – either by voting for her, or one of her party colleagues – the Minister for Justice. Her job in our system of Government is to make decisions on behalf of the people, and to implement them. If those decisions are to your disliking, you then have the right to remove her from office.
There can, and should, be no more fundamental question of political accountability in a democracy than the amount of force the state is permitted to deploy against an individual citizen, and in what circumstances that force may be deployed. It is a question for which the Government, and the Minister, should be taking full personal responsibility. But that is not happening here.
What is happening is the standard formulation for all Irish politicians everywhere: She is calling on someone else to do her job for her.
This is not confined to the Minister for Justice: it generally happens at all levels of Irish politics. My friend, Jason O’Mahony, late of the Irish Independent, notes that it is entirely possible for an Irish politician to have a thirty year career in which they spend their time simply “calling” on others to do things. This starts in the local councils, where councillors have little power and spend most of their time calling on the county manager to do something or other. It happens as an elected backbench TD, where calling for things is the bread and butter of the job. And it transfers into Ministerial office, by which time “calling” for things is so deeply engrained in the political mind that the very concept of actually doing something yourself is anathema.
The result is a political system with very little accountability, because Ministers who call on unelected bodies to do things or, as in this case, “ask them” to do things are not actually making decisions at all. Ultimately, now, in Ireland, the use of Garda force is not a matter for you the voter, or Helen the Minister at all. She can ask nicely on your behalf. That’s about it.
It’s also nonsense: If the Minister does not approve of a decision made by the policing authority, she has the statutory power to simply disband that authority and make the decision herself.
She’d never do it. That’s why she’s a bad Minister.
The problem is, she’s not alone.