The importance of the report of the Strategic Management Initiative (SMI) on the Garda, published yesterday, can scarcely be exaggerated. This is a report that will stand with Conroy in 1970 and Ryan in 1979 as a landmark document on the efficiency and effectiveness of the force. The salient point now is whether the SMI report will become a blueprint for action as its authors hope - or whether it will be allowed to gather dust in the manner of its predecessors
With cool detachment, the report chronicles some of the more obvious difficulties that have beset the force; a body of criminal law and an investigative procedure that has failed to keep pace with the modus operandi of modern professional crime; a traditional rostering system that takes little account of policing or public need; a complicated, unsatisfactory relationship between the Garda leadership and the Department of Justice; the need for greater civilianisation and a conspicuous lack of a well-defined overall objective for the force.
The most controversial section of the report is likely to be its demand for radical changes in the criminal law, including a significant extensions of the Garda's powers of detention and arrest and some modification of the right to silence. The report cautions wisely that the constitutional implications of any such moves will have to be assessed carefully in framing legislation. Few fair-minded people would question its fundamental finding that the Garda has often lacked the legal instruments to elicit evidence and to secure convictions.
It might also be remembered that the SMI itself was established as part of the response by the previous administration to the murder of Veronica Guerin. The killing of Ms Guerin symbolised the ruthlessness and organisation of professional criminals in Dublin. But it also underlined how a relatively small number of criminal gangs was emboldened by the feeble response of the political system, the Garda and the criminal law. The proposals of the SMI for increased Garda powers - still relatively modest by EU standards - are a worthwhile attempt to give the Garda the scope it needs to mount effective investigations.
The SMI document anticipates a time when the Garda - like every other modern police force in the developed world - has clearly defined goals and objective, when resources are deployed in a way which best reflects the needs of the public and when the power of the Commissioner vis a vis the Minister is clearly defined. The baton has now been passed to the Minister for Justice, Mr O'Donoghue. The signs are encouraging. The Government has accepted the report's proposal for a thoroughgoing review of the force's operations over three years. The Minister appears enthusiastic about the overwhelming majority of the SMI proposals.
It is also the case that Mr O'Donoghue has, thus far at least, shown a welcome inclination to move beyond the ad hoc approach towards the force. He has attempted to move beyond the customary agenda about Garda pay and resources. There will, assuredly, be no shortage of difficulties, but the Minister also has a historic opportunity to embark upon the most radical reform of the Garda in its 75-year history.