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Penalty Points

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  • 22-05-2013 12:38pm
    #1
    kippy
    Registered Users Posts: 18,488 ✭✭✭✭


    Is it just me or is there something fishy about current events in relation the penalty points.
    First of all, I believe the report into them was anything but thorough and indeed how can a report by a member of the force be taken seriously anyway?
    This was pretty much the big news, people calling for an independent report, questions being asked about the Gardai and potential for at worst corruption, at best "bending" of the rules for who you know.
    There was a fair bit of heat on this. Now, that appears to be forgotten about after Shatters' comments on Wallace.

    Would I be giving politicians and their spin doctors too much credit for suggesting that Shatters comments were an effort to take the pressure off the "real" and far bigger question of an independent report?


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    #2
    Cody Pomeray
    Closed Accounts Posts: 3,648 ✭✭✭Cody Pomeray


    The most serious implication of the GSOC Report relates to whistleblowers' willingness to come forward in future.

    If May 2013 has been a bad month for the Garda Síochána - Boylan Inquiry, Penalty Points Inquiry, The Wallace Affair - it has been an even worse month for public trust in the Gardaí and worse yet again for dissenting voices within that organization.

    If I were a serving member of the force and a conscientious objector to corrupt or improper practices within that force, the last thing I would be minded to do would be to bring that concern to the attention of a public representative, and probably not even to the Garda Confidential Recipient.

    It is disturbing to think that serious allegations of improper behaviour within the force - when such allegations were made by a serving Garda - were ignored by the Garda Commissioner, the Taoiseach and the Minister for Justice.

    I once had to write to a number of Government departments including the Department of Justice, requesting some pretty trivial information for a college research project. The official dealing with my request was extremely efficient, prompt and helpful. If the Department can be so attentive to the integrity of an undergraduate research project, and ignore internal Garda complaints of impropriety, we have a big problem.


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