I would like to ask the Taoiseach about the high-level report on the Department of Justice and Equality, which was produced by Mr. Ó Ríordáin and which, according to Mr. Pat Leahy, makes some important points regarding accountability and the budget and resources of An Garda Síochána. When will that be published? Will the Dáil get a chance to discuss it?

Why was there no public competition for the position of Secretary General of the Department of Justice and Equality? The latter is a key Department of Government. Everybody believes that most government-related jobs should be filled through public competition. Why was there no competition in this case? The appointee, Mr. O'Driscoll, has a fine track record but we would have expected a public competition.

The justice matter I particularly want to ask about is based on the Central Statistics Office, CSO, report on recorded crime in the year to the end of March 2018. Many people find the contents very disturbing and disappointing. The statistics show a general significant increase in crime across nearly all categories. For example, sexual offences rose by almost 15%, to over 3,000. Attempts of threats to murder, assault and harass were up nearly 14%, to over 19,000 crimes. Robbery, extortion and hijacking rose by 16%, and theft and related offences were up 8%, to almost 70,000 crimes. Damage to property rose by 5%, to over 23,000 offences. Homicides show a decline in this period but, of course, the statistics do not include the terrible second quarter of 2018 in which there seemed to have been an appalling homicide almost every second day.

These figures are published by the CSO as statistics under reservation due to ongoing concerns about the quality of data from An Garda Síochána's PULSE database. What steps is the Taoiseach taking to address this very worrying increase in crime during his period in office and when will the CSO be in a position to publish regular crime statistics without qualification?

These shocking crime statistics are echoed in episodes of appalling antisocial and criminal behaviour in districts of my constituency and the north division of the Garda Dublin metropolitan region. During the Taoiseach's period in office, there has been a significant upsurge in antisocial behaviour, thefts, intimidation, harassment, joyriding and serious drug-related crimes. I have in front of me a petition from 200 residents from a district of the north fringe of Dublin city who are complaining bitterly about the recent spate of thefts of cars, motorbikes and bicycles from their new homes. They are demanding a permanent Garda presence in this vast, new urban district.

In the period to mid-2014, when the Taoiseach was a Minister, the then Government decimated Garda numbers. Every time our local Garda personnel respond - under Chief Superintendent Curran and his officers in the north division of the Dublin metropolitan region - they outline their policing plans but they talk about very tight budgets and the problem of the reducing number of personnel in several districts. The Taoiseach will probably respond with the mantra about having 21,000 Garda personnel by 2021 but there have been no staff increases in the north division of the Dublin metropolitan region, only cuts. There is a report in the media that overtime budgets are being cut by up to 40%. Can the Taoiseach confirm whether this is the case and whether the Garda budget of €1.65 billion for 2018 is adequate?

There has been a generally positive welcome for the appointment of the new Garda Commissioner, Mr. Drew Harris. I welcome his appointment. Will the Taoiseach give him the resources and tools to transform An Garda Síochána from September and to deal with the growing lawlessness that has been a feature of the Taoiseach's period in office?

I thank Mr. Pádraig Ó Ríordáin and his group for the report provided to the Government. We approved it yesterday. It builds on the Toland report and sets out an 18-month timeframe during which the Department of Justice and Equality is to be reformed. It involves dividing the Department into two divisions, one with responsibility for home affairs and the other with responsibility for justice and law reform, with a deputy secretary general heading each and with Civil Service programme managers in the Department to ensure that the Minister's office is kept fully abreast of what is happening in those areas. Quite radically, it involves a real change across the Department, breaking up the work into areas such as policy, operations and legislation. This is very different from the silos we typically have in Departments whereby everything is broken up by policy area. Within each policy area, the person in charge is supposed to be responsible for everything, from legislation and communications to parliamentary questions and policy documents. If what is proposed works, it could be a very good model for the modernisation and reform of other Departments. Let us see whether it works in this Department first.

There is no requirement that all Secretaries General positions be open to public competition. On this occasion, we took the view that it was important that the person who became Secretary General had experience of being the Secretary General of a Department. It is, therefore, essentially a promotion. It involves somebody moving up from being a Secretary General in an important but relatively small Department to being a Secretary General in a much more challenging and complex Department. It is a matter of promotion rather than open competition. The post of Secretary General of the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine, which is being vacated as a result of the promotion, will be open to full competition. That decision was made yesterday also.

On tackling crime, there are many things the Government can do and is doing - never mind our target for the future. Since the end of 2016, the number of members of the Garda force has increased by 600 and recruitment continues. We are investing in new Garda stations - modern stations - like the one that can be seen in Kevin Street and the one in Sligo, in addition to some others that are very much going ahead. There is also investment in Garda ICT and vehicles. The current budget for the Garda is unprecedented, amounting to €1.6 billion. It is an enormous budget.

Once again, I have to say to the Deputy - I know he does not accept this - that it is about more than resources. If one wants public services to function well, staff and resources are only part of the picture. Reform is needed. One needs to make sure the resources and staff are deployed in the best interest of those who pay for them and those who use and need to the services. That has not always been the case. It will be very much part of the role of the new Commissioner and his team to ensure that staff and resources are deployed in the interest of the taxpayers who pay for them and the citizens who need them.

When the Taoiseach is walking around the country and when we are walking around constituencies, the one thing that always sticks in one's mind when crime and bad antisocial behaviour are raised, as happens regularly, is that people want to see gardaí - male and female - on the streets.

The visibility of gardaí is missing, and that is a key problem. It is about resources, numbers, particularly on the front line. That must be addressed. We also must have a full discussion of the O'Ríordáin report because apparently it makes important points about accountability and the fact that there is no central accountability in the Department of Justice and Equality. Civil servants and gardaí sometimes have ended up in the same trench together. Garda Commissioner Harris must get rid of that mindset.

I wish to make two final points. Emily Logan, Chief Commissioner of the Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission, recently drew attention to the Lifecycle of a Hate Crime: Country Report for Ireland and said that we are deficient in responding to hate crime. Is that at the top of the Government's agenda for legislation given that she said legislation is required? Finally, I have asked probably 30 times during this Administration for reports on the ongoing investigations of serious white collar crime on foot of the findings of the Flood, Mahon and Moriarty tribunals. When will other Deputies and I get a proper report on the investigation following those tribunals?