Garda reform is out of season. It would have been better done a good few years ago when there was momentum and a recognition that the culture and the practice of policing in Ireland was in need of renewal. Government and Garda leaders responded to that momentum in a fashion, but not with the conviction, determination and focus that is necessary to reform such a large and entrenched organisation.
I first became aware of a problem in the mid-1970s when a priest in Donegal told me that the local guards were more interested in building and selling second homes than they were in policing. That was almost 30 years before the Morris tribunal reported that the organisation was suffering from low morale, poor discipline, lack of oversight and a culture of silence.
The scaffolding of change has since been put in place with the Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission (Gsoc), the Garda Síochána Inspectorate and the Policing Authority, and yet there is a perception that the change is only skin deep and that a once proud and effective organisation, which contributed greatly to the character and stability of the country, continues to be embroiled in energy-sapping internal problems.
It is ironic that the benchmark of effective reform that is most often cited is the formation of the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) in the North. There are certainly similarities in many of the structures that have been established around both organisations to make them more transparent and accountable, but while that comparison is understandable, it is also dangerous. It carries with it all the over-simplification of cut-and-paste.
Nuanced
The truth is more nuanced. The changes that transformed the RUC into the PSNI had a study, consultation, planning, implementation, monitoring and consolidation dynamic that the Garda could only dream of. It had the undivided attention, and ultimately the presence, of every shade of political opinion. New technology and equipment were readily provided. And, on top of that, it had a budget that bordered on foolishness. For a period of years, many blockages to change could be solved with extraordinarily generous redundancy packages.
There was also an international group monitoring the pace of change. The task was difficult but well-defined: it was to transform a semi-militarised force that was overly identified with one section of the community into a police service that had the confidence of the whole community because it provided an unbiased, professional and sensitive service.
The Garda Síochána starts from a different place. It is blessed with the confidence of the majority of the people. It has never been militarised. It is rightly proud of its history and contribution. It continues to have respect within local areas.
Currently, gardaí are hurt, saddened or demoralised, depending on age and experience, by the continuing negative revelations and reports emanating from the media and oversight bodies. They are reeling under the deluge of accusations that they operate in a self- protective culture and that they are inefficient at crime prevention and detection.
That mixture of respect and detraction can be more blinding to the need for and the possibility of reform than either of its constituent parts. It encourages strong opinions, ranging from the assertion that more resources and manpower are the required solution, and that governments who have let the force run down during the austerity years are fully to blame, to the more cynical proposition that nothing will ever change until the whole senior management team are replaced.
Neither feasible nor desirable
The money, the energy and the talent that was thrown at policing in the North is neither feasible nor desirable. More external reports and investigations into wrongdoings or incompetence will add to the hurt and cynicism. Real and lasting reform should be nurtured from within the force itself. As in proper therapy, the patient is the problem but also the solution. The power of recovery lies within the organisation, but only if it recognises or is forced to recognise the problem, the mix of hurt, demoralisation, disappointment, anger, cynicism and arrogance.
Good therapy clarifies the problem and identifies the obstacles and attitudes that prevent recovery. The secret is to find a good therapist who has the authority, the confidence and the time to get in among the pain and the disaffection, and who is as unshakable and unshockable as the most hardened street cop.
The only organisation capable of undertaking or mandating such a role is the Policing Authority. Part of its role was to take the politics out of policing, so no politicians were put on the committee. Big mistake. The secret is not to take the politics out of policing, but to make sure that there is buy-in and participation from the broadest spectrum of political opinion. That broad spectrum of political participation should also ensure that the authority is not under the thumb of the Department of Justice, which has always been loath to let go of control.
Leaving that aside, and leaving aside the legal talk about holding the Garda leadership to account, the authority needs to set about winning the confidence of rank-and-file gardaí while simultaneously convincing the public that it is the organisation that will drive and facilitate reform.
It is a big task, but it can be done.
If the policing issue continues to be kicked between judicial, oversight and accountable organisations without taking into account the hurts and hopes of the men and women who make up the service and without convincing the public that there is clear and determined leadership driving through the necessary reforms, there is a danger that the great blessing that An Garda Síochána has been to this country will be damaged beyond repair.
Denis Bradley is a former vice-chairman of the police board for the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI)