Apologies have been received from Deputy Callaghan. Deputy James Geoghegan will attend in substitution. I ask members to turn off their mobile phones.

The purpose of this meeting is to have an engagement on the topic of the current bail laws in Ireland and related matters. On behalf of the committee I extend a warm welcome to our witnesses. From the Law Society of Ireland, we are joined by Mr. Gary Mulchrone and Dr. Brian Hunt; from the Bar of Ireland by Ms Aoife O'Leary and from the Irish Penal Reform Trust, by Ms Saoirse Brady and Ms Niamh McCormack. They are welcome back.

I want to give a particular welcome to Lucia and Jim O'Farrell. They are no strangers to Leinster House but today is the first time they will give formal evidence to an Oireachtas committee. All the members will know Lucia and Jim and their tragic story but also their dignified quest for truth and justice.

The format of the meeting is that I will invite group or individual to make an opening statement of three minutes and then members of the committee, in the order in which they have indicated to me, will put their questions. We will assess at that stage the length of time for interactions.

Before I invite our guests to deliver opening statements, I want to explain some limitations to parliamentary privilege and the practices of the Houses as regards references a witness may make to other persons in their evidence. The evidence of witnesses physically present or who give evidence from within the parliamentary precincts is protected, pursuant to both the Constitution and statute, by absolute privilege.

Witnesses are reminded of the long-standing parliamentary practice that they should not criticise or make charges against any person or entity by name or in such a way as to make him, her or it identifiable or otherwise engage in speech that might be regarded as damaging to the good name of the person or entity. Therefore, if their statements are potentially defamatory in respect of an identifiable person or entity, they will be directed to discontinue their remarks. It is imperative that they comply with any such direction.

I invite people to make their opening statements, starting with Ms Lucia O'Farrell. Lucia is very welcome.

I thank the Chair and members of the committee for inviting me here today and giving me the opportunity to speak on the very important issue of the current bail laws in Ireland.

I am the mother of Shane, aged 23. Shane was killed in a hit and run in August 2011 by a criminal who was in breach of bail from numerous District Courts and Circuit Courts at the time.

Shane was a beautiful soul, exceptionally kind and good. He was witty. He loved life, nature, music and rugby. We simply adored him. He will remain a great loss to us, until we join him.

To lose a child is the end of everything, of time itself and the time left unwanted. Losing a child to violence and another person’s actions, causes great grief with a profound sense of injustice, and anger about the life that was taken and the future that was stolen.

As outlined in the Dáil by the Minister for justice, on 27 May 2025, the individual who killed our child had committed 30 offences while on bail over a two-year period. He was in breach of bail, as I said, from numerous District Courts and Circuit Courts. Repeated breaches of bail were known but not acted upon. That is the real worry. If bail is fixed and not adhered to then that is a breach of a court order. There needs to be a consequence and a deterrent for those who show scant regard for court orders.

Breaches of bail should always be brought to the attention of the court and it must be ensured that there are objections for bail in all appropriate cases. The Garda needs to monitor compliance with bail conditions.

This Government is addressing the need to strengthen bail laws. Our family commend it on this because if the State does not take bail terms seriously then it is difficult to expect those on bail to treat them seriously or abide by the conditions set out. The State needs to be far more intolerant of violations of bail terms than it is at present.

On 27 May 2025, the Minister for justice commissioned a review of the bail laws in Ireland. Mr. Lorcan Staines SC was appointed. The review was prompted by ongoing concerns over recidivist offenders and tragically high-profile failures in bail monitoring. A few months later, in October 2025, the report entitled An Assessment of the Efficacy of Bail Laws in Ireland was completed and contained 15 recommendations. Our family thank Mr. Lorcan Staines for his work on this very comprehensive report.

The report was published by the Department of justice. It found that while bail laws go as far as constitutionally possible, "the system operates in a cumbersome, inefficient, inconsistent and haphazard manner”. This examination of the bail laws and its recommendations underline the need for additional actions to be taken to ensure the criminal justice system does not put citizens at risk with individuals on bail.

In what appears to be ongoing, at present the length of time from when a criminal offence is committed to conviction could be two and half years. Meanwhile, during that time, the individual may continue to commit crime. Those who do plead guilty and are sentenced will appeal that sentence and be given bail, only to be allowed to commit further criminal offences. Offenders will accumulate a number of criminal charges before they will plead guilty in the District Court or Circuit Court. They will then hope to get a concurrent or reduced sentence. It is totally unacceptable that offences are committed by people on bail. This is a direct breach of the promise made when bail is granted by the court.

The report by Mr. Lorcan Staines is a detailed analysis that will assist in considering how the criminal justice system might better respond to recidivist offenders who persistently break summary laws. Our family welcome the 15 recommendations made by Mr. Staines.

We believe the following two recommendations deserve a special mention. Recommendation No. 7 is that responsibility for the prosecution of offences be removed from An Garda Síochána and that all future court proceedings be conducted by legal professionals. I note that a prosecution steering committee led by the Department of the Taoiseach is currently considering this issue. In September 2018, the Commission on the Future of Policing in Ireland produced a report. It also recommended that all prosecutions decisions be taken away from the police and given to an expanded State solicitor or national prosecution service. It also recommended that the practice of police prosecuting cases in court should cease and noted that most comparable jurisdictions recognise that investigation and prosecution processes should be separate. I understand that following this report by the commission, the Minister put a high-level review group in place to look at this recommendation. The review group made a recommendation for An Garda Síochána to retain responsibility for the conduct of prosecutions in court. Mr. Staines's report now trumps this.

Recommendation No. 10 is that the Bail Act 1997 be amended to provide that a member of An Garda Síochána who reasonably suspects that a person has breached a condition of his or her bail bond may arrest him or her without warrant in order to bring him or her before the court forthwith for the purposes of an application for the revocation of bail or the amendment of bail conditions.

I understand that the Minister has now asked his officials to consider the feasibility of implementing each of the 15 recommendations. Implementing the recommendations by Lorcan Staines SC will go a long way to ensure that there is not another victim like Shane. Unless the Government takes the bail issue seriously, we will continue to see totally preventable crime and deaths like that of our beautiful Shane devastating families and communities.

There is a vote in the Seanad. Are members happy for us to proceed? I invite Mr. Mulchrone to make his opening statement.

I thank the Cathaoirleach and the committee for the opportunity for the Law Society to appear before the committee to address the operation of current bail laws in Ireland. I am a solicitor and a member of the criminal law committee of the Law Society and my practice is focused on criminal law. I am joined today by my colleague Dr. Brian Hunt, director of policy at the Law Society.

The presumption in favour of bail is a fundamental principle of the criminal justice system. It balances the constitutional right to liberty, the presumption of innocence and the legitimate expectation of public safety. It is essential that any consideration of potential reforms is measured and evidence-based. The granting of bail is an exercise by the judge to balance competing interests such as the presumption of innocence and public safety.

The Law Society welcomes the Staines report and agrees with many of its central observations. In particular, the importance of the broader context in which bail decisions are made, such as the current problem of prison overcrowding, cannot be minimised. This has real and immediate consequences, which include the early release of sentenced prisoners to create space for remand prisoners and a reduced capacity to provide rehabilitative supports, which in turn leads to an increased risk of reoffending.

Against this backdrop, the Law Society proposes that consideration be given to a series of changes that are aimed primarily at improving bail decision making and strengthening the supervision of accused persons who are granted bail. First, the quality of information provided to the judge at the time of an application for bail needs to be improved. Practitioners consistently report challenges with the quality and completeness of the information available to the court for bail applications. Decisions about liberty depend on accurate and reliable evidence. A judge deciding on an application for bail relies on the information provided by An Garda Síochána. In practice, this information does not always include whether or not the accused has already committed offences while on bail or whether he or she has already breached previous bail conditions. The inaccuracies of the information before the judge undermine his or her ability to properly assess risk.

A further issue that has been highlighted by practitioners concerns inconsistent Garda practice. Practitioners’ experience has been that there can be disparities in the approach adopted by members of An Garda Síochána across different districts regarding the issue of bail. Practitioners are seeing variations in the use of station bail, a differing approach to objections to bail and challenges in relation to the quality and timeliness of bail documentation provided to defence solicitors. We agree with the recommendations of the Staines report that seek to enhance standardisation to promote fairness, predictability and confidence in the administration of justice.

Additional tools should be made available to assist the courts in managing risks. Legislative provision of the use of electronic monitoring has been on the Statute Book for the past 19 years but has not yet been commenced.

If properly implemented and adequately resourced, electronic monitoring could provide the courts with an additional tool to manage risk in cases where bail might otherwise be refused. We are calling for the commencement of this provision and are also proposing that legislation be amended to allow judges to consider electronic monitoring as part of the bail conditions when deciding on an application for bail. We also call for the legislation to be amended so as to allow an accused apply for electronic monitoring.

The Law Society is also calling for greater use to be made of the European supervision order. This mechanism allows an accused person who lives in another jurisdiction to be supervised in their home state while awaiting trial in Ireland. Despite its potential benefits, it remains significantly underutilised in Ireland, largely due to limited awareness and procedural uncertainty. A wider application of this instrument could reduce the need for remand in cases where there are concerns that the accused may be a flight risk.

At the same time, care must be taken in considering the creation of new or expanded powers. As stated in the Staines report, any fundamental change to the bail laws would require constitutional amendment. For example, proposals to allow gardaí to attach conditions to station bail raise important constitutional questions. Likewise, discussions around the use of cash bail must be informed by data, particularly as to whether it operates disproportionately against those in vulnerable or disadvantaged circumstances.

In term of enforcement, the Law Society considers that the current framework is, in broad terms, effective and proportionate. The Law Society supports the proposed introduction of an adult bail supervision scheme, similar to that operating for minors, as a constructive measure to support compliance and reduce reoffending.

Finally, regarding offences committed while on bail, we believe that the existing legislative approach strikes an appropriate balance. In conclusion, the Law Society's position is that Ireland's bail system is well balanced but its operation and implementation is inconsistent and somewhat inefficient. The focus of future reforms should be on improving its operation: ensuring that courts have access to complete and accurate information; promoting consistency in practice; enhancing the tools available to manage risk; and investing in the resources necessary to support these changes. Above all, we must continue to uphold the constitutional principles that underpin the system. We thank the committee for its attention and we are happy to address any questions that members may have.

I thank the Chair and members of the committee for the invitation to appear before them today. The council of the Bar of Ireland welcomes the opportunity to address the joint committee on justice in relation to the current bail laws in Ireland.

The central point of our submission is straightforward. The core legal principles underpinning Irish bail law are sound, proportionate and firmly rooted in the constitutional protection of personal liberty and the presumption of innocence. Article 40.4.1° of the Constitution provides that no citizen shall be deprived of personal liberty save in accordance with law. The refusal of bail or the remand of a person in custody otherwise than in accordance with law constitutes a breach of constitutional rights. The cornerstone of the criminal justice system is that every accused person is presumed to be innocent. It follows that bail is to be regarded as a right rather than a privilege, and that the constitutional presumption in favour of bail must be displaced by sufficient evidence before a court can refuse bail to any accused person. It is important to stress that although there is a constitutional presumption in favour of bail being granted, there is no automatic entitlement to release in every case.

The law already empowers the courts to refuse bail where this is reasonably considered necessary to prevent the commission of a serious offence and-or where there exists a likelihood that the accused will not surrender for trial and-or will interfere with witnesses, jurors or evidence. In our view, as the Staines report concluded, Irish bail law has already gone as far as is constitutionally permissible. The principal challenge lies not in the absence of legal powers but in the cumbersome, inefficient and inconsistent operation of the existing system. This matters because public confidence in the administration of justice is undermined when it appears that the law is not being effectively enforced. Our members' experience is that bail conditions are often monitored reactively rather than proactively. In practice, compliance may only come into focus after a person has been charged with a further offence, rather than being monitored in a way that allows timely intervention and, where appropriate, an application to revoke bail before further offending occurs.

The law already provides mechanisms to respond. A court may revoke bail where the conditions of a recognisance have been breached, including where a person on bail commits and is convicted of a further summary offence. There is also a limited summary arrest power available in certain urgent circumstances. Accordingly, the question is not simply whether additional legal powers are required.

Rather, it is whether the powers that already exist are supported by systems that enable them to be exercised effectively, consistently and at the appropriate time. That is why our submission focuses on practical reform.

It appears that the PULSE system does not adequately identify when a person is on bail, has breached bail conditions or has committed offences while on bail. It also appears to lack an effective mechanism for managing multiple concurrent bail bonds across different matters and districts. We believe there should be a system that clearly identifies existing bail bonds, helps prevent contradictory bail conditions from arising and alerts An Garda Síochána, and through them the courts, to existing obligations when fresh bail is being considered. We also suggest that where a person is convicted of an offence, the court should be informed of any existing bail bonds so that the question of revocation can be considered promptly. Better information-sharing between the Courts Service and An Garda Síochána should be prioritised.

Any discussion of reform must remain grounded in practical reality. Prison overcrowding already presents a significant challenge and any substantial increase in the use of custodial remand would be difficult to accommodate without additional capacity. For those reasons, our submission encourages the committee to focus on practical measures that strengthen enforcement, improve information-sharing, promote operational consistency and support the timely use of existing powers where justified. Such reforms would enhance reinforce public confidence in the administration of justice while remaining faithful to the constitutional principles that underpin Ireland’s bail laws. I again thank the Chair for the opportunity to appear before the committee. I hope our submission will assist the committee in its deliberations. I will answer any questions members may have.

The Irish Penal Reform Trust, IPRT, thanks the committee for the opportunity to provide observations on the efficacy of bail laws in Ireland. I first would like to acknowledge the strength of the O'Farrell family, who have obviously been failed by the State in their quest for answers. The IPRT would support their campaign for justice because we believe that serious questions remain to be answered in that case. I wanted to make those comments and acknowledge those points.

This hearing is particularly timely given forthcoming research that the IPRT will publish later this month on the operation of pre-trial detention in Ireland. Our research indicates that Irish bail laws, and their application in practice, is an opaque area of the criminal justice system in need of major, evidence-based reform. It is also timely given that almost 6,000 people are in prison today. People should only be remanded to custody as a last resort, yet almost one in five people in prison are in pre-trial detention or on remand while they await trial or sentencing, often for minor offences. The rates and types of offences committed while on bail indicate an ongoing concern that the IPRT shares with colleagues regarding bail conditions that are overly restrictive or where the person is unable to adhere to those conditions.

Figures from 2024 demonstrate that the vast majority of offences committed on bail were minor offences, with the highest proportion being theft from a shop, at nearly 20%, followed by breach of bail conditions and public order offences, at 14% each. The affordability of bail appears to be a factor driving remand rates during a cost of-living and homelessness crisis, and subjective perceptions around what is deemed affordable differ. We know of people unable to pay €30 or €50 bail. Cash bail in itself can be a wasteful use of resources, placing additional pressure on an already overstretched prison system to commit a person to prison only for them to be released hours or days later.

The criminalisation of people with mental health issues is a key area of concern for the IPRT. In February 2026, 2,425 people were on a waiting list to access psychology services in prison. Many people remanded to custody experiencing acute mental health challenges would be better served in a therapeutic healthcare setting, yet the practice of therapeutic bail has been discontinued since December 2025. Judges have been vocal about their reluctance to remand a person to custody where there is clearly a mental health concern, yet they feel they have no alternative. The Chief Inspector of Prisons in his thematic report on psychiatric care in the Irish prison system talked about trying to get a bed or a transfer to a bed in a psychiatric hospital as being akin to horse trading.

In 2025, 74% of people held on remand did not go on to serve a sentence because they were not found guilty or because the time they had already spent in remand custody was considered as time already served. Pre-trial detention is a traumatic experience that can have untold consequences for family relationships, employment or accommodation prospects and a person's overall well-being, all of which are important factors to prevent reoffending.

In 2024, rates of self-harm for people on remand in Irish prisons were more than double the rate of people who were sentenced. In August 2025, we made a detailed submission to the Staines review and we have made a more detailed submission to the committee. The IPRT is happy to answer the committee's questions on these submissions. Our report will be launched on 20 July and will hopefully help the committee in drafting its report, because it will contain a series of recommendations that we believe are relevant to today's discussion.

I am so sorry about the loss of the O'Farrell family's son. As a mother, I could not imagine the trauma, stress and loss that they are feeling every day.

I would like to start with the Schedule of offences for bail. While I recognise what Ms Brady was talking about as regards us sometimes remanding people who should not be there, and we should absolutely be taking into account addictions and mental health, I feel that there are gaps in the Schedule. For example, we do not have any provision for domestic violence, that is, anyone who breaches a barring order. If people have breached a barring order, it is serious enough and in itself should become a serious offence and, therefore, be added to the Schedule. Coercive control should also be added to the Schedule, but there is a balance to be struck with regard to who we remand and who we do not. An offence may seem quite minor, but if someone commits a further offence while out on bail, the consequences of their actions can be devastating, as we have seen in the O'Farrells' situation. I invite anyone to comment on that and the Schedule of offences regarding bail.

To clarify, when we say minor offences, we do not mean to trivialise criminal offences that have been committed, but only to say that the legal term "minor offence" means it is tried in the District Court. We fully appreciate that there can be devastating consequences for minor offences, but ultimately, we are talking about what is in the District Court. Regarding the Deputy's comments on domestic violence, the Act was scheduled before coercive control was a criminal offence. That would definitely be something we could see.

Are the witnesses happy with the Schedule of offences as it stands at the moment?

The Deputy makes very valid points about adding to it. That needs to be reviewed. The other thing about the Schedule, and Ms McCormack can correct me if I am wrong, is that, as Ms O'Leary mentioned, it is about the application of the Schedule and what is deemed a serious offence. We look at that in the research and how that is being applied or misapplied in particular cases, because there are people who go on to commit serious violent offences while out on bail and there are questions to be asked about why they were out on bail. Some of our colleagues have alluded to the gaps in knowledge that the judge has when making decisions about risk. That needs to be addressed.

The Schedule is quite wide-ranging. Generally, as new offences are created, they are added to the Schedule. I note that the Staines report makes recommendations relating to coercive control, which would appear to be an omission, and perhaps interference with witnesses and jurors.

Regarding domestic violence, it is probably important to say that, while the specific offence of breaching an order under the Domestic Violence Act is not a scheduled offence, because, as currently on the Statute Book, it is a summary-only charge, which carries a maximum-----

That in itself is a problem.

Perhaps. I want to make clear that a serious incident of domestic violence that might involve assault, criminal damage or something of that nature would have the potential to trigger an objection under section 2 on the basis that the person was charged with a serious offence and there may be a concern about further serious offending.

If the allegation is that, in the context of breaching a barring order, the alleged offender has assaulted the person who holds the domestic violence order, has damaged their property or has stolen something belonging to them, An Garda Síochána is in a position to make an objection under section 2 of the Bail Act, which is the provision that allows for objections on the basis that bail needs to be refused to prevent people from committing a further serious offence. There is some protection, but I am aware that there is a recommendation on the breach of the order as well.

It is rare that we get complete consensus among all witnesses that the law is sound and appropriate but the resourcing and the allocation of funding are not adequate. It is clear here and in the recommendations that a root-and-branch review is required. I note and welcome that the Minister, Deputy Jim O'Callaghan, is looking at all 15 recommendations, but there seems to have been some hesitation, in that he was not in favour of An Garda Síochána not prosecuting the cases. Will the witnesses illuminate that?

We have to bear in mind that the Commission on the Future of Policing in Ireland recommended this in 2018 and the then Minister appointed a high-level review group. An Garda Síochána prosecutes at the suit of the Director of Public Prosecutions, DPP, and that high-level review group was made up of members of the Garda, members of the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions and officials of the Department of justice, so it was like getting turkeys to vote for Christmas. The group recommended that An Garda Síochána continue to prosecute.

In Northern Ireland, a barrister or solicitor - a legal professional - does it because it is said that a person who carries out an investigation should not also prosecute. The reason this is concerning is that the court needs to make an informed decision about whether to grant someone bail. People will frequently say that it is the responsibility of the judge, but a judge can only go on the information before the court. The duty of the prosecution is to bring the facts to the court about bail, previous convictions and so on. What if they are not brought to court for some reason, whether it is a quid pro quo for giving information or for information the person is yet to give, or to develop a relationship with an informant? Bearing in mind that we have no legislation in this country - we are an anomaly in Europe as regards legislation on covert human intelligence sources, CHIS - we continue to have An Garda Síochána almost directing the narrative of what the outcome in the court will be, because judges are not given the full information.

In the case of our son, the man was on bail for two full years and during those two years he continued to commit crimes and no one said, "Your honour, he got bail last week and he has now committed a crime, five days of theft", or that conditions were imposed that he not leave the jurisdiction, that he abstain from alcohol and that he sign on daily. He was pulled up at 12.30 a.m. when his curfew was 11 p.m. He was across the Border, so the PSNI contacted An Garda Síochána and An Garda Síochána did nothing. He did not sign on although he was supposed to do so daily. There are gaps everywhere in his signing on and there was no signature for four months before he killed Shane. Judges can only go on the information they are given and it is not acceptable. When we teased this out and saw the failure to bring the facts to the court, for whatever reason An Garda Síochána chose not to, we asked why. This resulted in the judge continually granting bail but he was not to know that the man was continually breaching bail. Then, An Garda Síochána said its members were not trained lawyers. That was the response.

There was a recommendation in 2018 by the Commission on the Future of Policing in Ireland. We now have a recommendation by Mr. Lorcan Staines. It is imperative. Even if none of the other 14 recommendations are implemented - they are all important - this one must be. I am sure that resources and finances will be looked at. They are always brought into things, but a price cannot be put on a life. We cannot continue to let An Garda Síochána prosecute because the facts are not being brought to court. Our case highlights that. I am sure it is not an isolated case. Judges need to know when someone is continually breaching bail, that restrictions like no drug or alcohol use were imposed but there was evidence of drug use in the car when they were pulled over, or that someone has five days of theft of alcohol.

That was evident across the board in our case but no action was taken. No information was brought to the court. No one ever said, "Your honour, we want to object to bail" or "Your honour, we are returning him and asking you to revoke bail". We need lawyers and solicitors in court to do that job. The Garda should do what they are trained to do, which is investigate and prevent crime. They certainly should not be prosecuting in court.

I thank all of the witnesses for their opening statements. I thank the O'Farrell family in particular for their opening statement and for the dignified manner in which they have conducted themselves in seeking to get justice for Shane. I have seen them on "Prime Time" and I have watched them from afar. I probably would never have met them in the normal course of life but here we are in a room together because of the tragic circumstances surrounding Shane's death.

Ms O'Farrell mentioned recommendation No. 10 in her opening statement. How significant would it be to implement recommendation No. 10, allowing gardaí to arrest without warrant where they reasonably suspect a breach of bail conditions?

It is important. We heard a few years ago that a young girl was attacked and raped. Gardaí were aware that the accused was in certain areas of Dublin but said they could not arrest him because they would have to get a warrant. It seems ridiculous that when a person is seen in an area the judge has said gardaí are not to go into Dublin 2 or the city centre, as we saw in a recent case. If the person does that, the gardaí should have the power of arrest. The man who killed Shane was pulled up at 12.30 a.m. The curfew was 11 p.m. but it did not matter. It did not matter that he did not sign on. Gardaí should have the power of arrest to return to court and say to the judge, "Your honour, you imposed bail conditions and expected them to be adhered to, and he is not adhering to them". They need to show some regard to enforcing them. Bring it back and let the court make a decision.

Ms O'Farrell mentioned that the person who killed Shane committed 30 offences while on bail. In Ms O'Farrell's view, what were the principal failures in the system that allowed this to happen?

The law in place at that time was not implemented. Please God, this will now strengthen bail laws so other families will not go through what Jim and I are going through as parents. The principal failure was that the courts were not being given the information and the man was continuously breaching bail. We cannot control what is brought to the attention of the court. None of us can. We would expect the facts to be brought to the court, as well as previous convictions, so the judge can make an informed decision. Members, as legislators, can ensure legislation is put in place providing that a barrister or solicitor brings those facts to the court; it might not be a quid pro quo for them or developing a relationship with an informant.

We have to have a situation where the judge knows all the facts and makes an informed decision. I do not think that is happening. It certainly did not happen in Shane's case because this man walked in and out. Sometimes he was in two courts in the one day. He could not attend one because he was in another. He did this for two years and it did not matter.

There is no point talking about the PULSE system. It is only as good as the information people put into it. It is a reservoir of information. There is a tab on the PULSE system for "bail". You can record bail on that. Bail is not recorded on the PULSE system. We had a situation where two gardaí were to be disciplined and pay a €200 fine for not checking when the judge said "Bring him back and I will jail him if he reoffends". He said "will" jail him, not "might". That is an order by a Circuit Court judge. Eleven offences were committed and he was not returned. Two of the gardaí in question who were to be fined €200 took judicial review proceedings. It was agreed on consent by the Garda Commissioner not to discipline them because there was no evidence they were ever trained on the PULSE system to check the court outcome tab. That is how bad it is. The core issue is that the facts need to be brought to the court.

Nothing can change for Shane, unfortunately, but what might be of great benefit would be to fix bail, to make it better for the citizens of this country. In 2012, just after Shane was killed, we lodged a complaint to the Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission.

Two years into that, it had not been concluded and Mr. Alan Shatter, the then Minister for justice, ordered GSOC to carry out a public interest investigation. That went on for another four years, so GSOC then had this for six years.

A public interest investigation is not just about the family's complaints; it allows GSOC to widen the scope of its investigation if it sees fit. That report was completed. We got a little summary version in which eight complaints each had a paragraph above them, none of which addressed the actual complaints. That report has been refused to us. It was ordered in the public interest, so it is in the public interest. That analysis took six years of research and taxpayers' money. I understand GSOC gets something like €21 million per year. The work is done and the committee can see it and find out why this series of events took place that allowed this man the liberty to kill. The content of that report might shape and lead legislation.

I thank Ms O'Farrell. I will finish up on a point Ms O'Leary made. She mentioned the PULSE system, as did Ms O'Farrell. I was not aware that there is a tab on the PULSE system for recording bail. That is why I am asking the question. Ms O'Leary said the system does not adequately identify when a person is on bail. Is that down to Garda training? What are her thoughts on that?

That is our understanding. Obviously, I am not directly familiar with the PULSE system as we do not have access to it and do not operate it ourselves. The Staines report made recommendations in relation to information sharing between the Courts Service and the PULSE system because the quality of judicial decision-making is, insofar as it has been pointed out, dependent on the quality of information presented. There should be an ability for the Garda system to flag to an individual member of An Garda Síochána that a person he or she may be interacting with is on bail and what the bail conditions may be. That should be something the member of An Garda Síochána is made aware of when he or she interacts with a member of the public and may have cause to make initial inquiries in relation to that person.

Individual gardaí are often extremely diligent and are trying to trawl through the information available to them to present bail objections to the court. The recommendations of the Staines report on streamlining that process and allowing the Courts Service and Garda systems to align so that there can be accurate recording of court orders and bail conditions would assist members of An Garda Síochána in preparing to object to bail.

This is not rocket science. It is 2026, and we should have an up-to-date IT system that can capture all the information needed, so that judges, prosecutors and others have all the data they need in front of them when they are making decisions.

We live close to the Border, which is about 9 km away. When Zigimantis Gridziuska went across the Border and committed crime there, he was in breach of bail from Monaghan and Cavan Circuit Courts and Carrickmacross District Court and he had received a suspended sentence in Ardee District Court. The judge in Monaghan Circuit Court had said that if he reoffended, he was to be returned to him where he would jail him and he might even get a trip to Donegal. He did not say he might jail him but that he would jail him. Gridziuska was then in Newry in the barracks. The PSNI contacted the Garda to say it had him and a fax was sent from An Garda Síochána to the PSNI. All they could rely on was the same mutual assistance. We need legislation that will provide that where a person crosses the Border and a judge in the North gives him a suspended sentence, he will be met at the Border and returned to the judge, rather than that depending on whomever is there on the day. We need that to be tightened up. One of the bail conditions was that Gridziuska not leave the jurisdiction. The Garda was notified by the PSNI that he was in the barracks in Newry and no action was taken.

I thank Ms O'Farrell again for coming before this committee and giving her testimony. I cannot imagine it is easy, but we really value her contribution. I had intended to ask her about the recommendations of the Staines report that she favours. The report recommended that all prosecution decisions be taken away from the gardaí and given to an expanded State solicitors office or national prosecution service. Ms O'Farrell answered that question very well when Deputy Butterly asked it. I ask the Bar or the Law Society how that might work from their perspective.

Will they expand on the answer Ms O'Farrell has given?

The Law Society position is that, currently, as an interim measure, gardaí on the ground should have the appropriate training to actually deal with objections to bail because the disparate approach from one Garda member to another, never mind from one Garda district to another, is quite surprising in practice when you see it on the ground. There is an inconsistent approach and the level of training and information that the gardaí currently have is variable. In the interim, that should be looked at as an area of investment or an area in which the Garda should make sure there is more consistency in its approach.

On expansion of the State solicitor's office, that is a matter for the Government to consider with regard to resources and investment. I think it would require significant recruitment of additional solicitors working in the full-time employment of the State, potentially, and local prosecutors who could be members of the Bar. There is a lot to consider in that respect.

There is a review under way in the Department of the Taoiseach. We await the outcome of that review with interest. Currently, the level of training that gardaí have to deal with bail applications and objections to bail is of a very variable standard. Sergeants might tend to take a more informed approach and may have more experience of whether they are dealing with an objection under the Bail Act or under O'Callaghan grounds, but that inconsistency is causing the bigger problem at the moment. I say that as a practitioner on the ground. That is an area that deserves considerable attention.

Does Ms O'Leary have anything to add to that?

I echo what Mr. Mulchrone has said.

The variable level of training would be a surprise to many people. Mr. Mulchrone talked about the need for training. Does any training exist at the moment?

I am not aware of exactly what level of training is given to individual Garda members, so that question should probably be posed to An Garda Síochána. I am simply not aware of it.

Based on the testimony of its members, does the Law Society see an inconsistency depending on district?

There is. As Ms O'Leary pointed out, it is not to denigrate the individual, committed nature of every garda. There is sometimes a lack of awareness. Gardaí are supposed to furnish defence solicitors with bail packs in advance of an application for bail. Sometimes we do not get one at all. Sometimes we get two pages stapled together that do not deal with all the grounds of objection. Sometimes we get a bail pack that does not have any parts filled out. There is an inconsistency of approach. That goes down to the fact that gardaí on the ground are dealing with the reality of it, while perhaps not having a full understanding of what the Bail Act is about.

One would initially think that this is a young, rookie garda from Templemore who is not aware of the importance of it. That is not the case. My deep concern is that there would be other reasons why information was not being brought to the court. In any event, gardaí are not trained lawyers. Their duty is to investigate crime.

Three weeks after Shane was killed, this man was on bail from Monaghan Circuit Court and if he reoffended, he was to be brought back anywhere on in the court's circuit, where he would be jailed, and he was on bail from Cavan Circuit Court. He was appealing a sentence for a drugs offence in Carrickmacross District Court. He was on a suspended sentence in Ardee in County Louth. In Newry, he was on a bond to keep the peace. He has now killed Shane. When Shane was killed, the following day, when Jim was asking me what type of coffin we wanted, the gardaí, in a special sitting of the court in Dundalk, said there was no objection to bail in this case. Three weeks later, the man committed a theft. At this stage, he was on full-time pre-release from prison. A very senior garda never said to the judge what I just told the committee. The judge adjourned the case for a month to consider community service.

That shows that it is not that it is not that one could get a very young, diligent garda. It was a very senior garda. It was not the judge's fault. He was unaware and adjourned the case for a month to consider community service. If nothing else happens, members, as legislators, need to push home that cost should not come into it. Public expenditure should not come into the preciousness of life when people go out for a walk, run or jog. A mother with children in her car should not be conscious that there could be somebody at liberty who should not be. We should not be depending on what garda brings the information to court. All the facts necessary for the judge to make an informed decision need to be brought to that court. That gives the best chance, and that is not happening at the moment.

It is absolutely not the intention of anyone to denigrate an individual garda.

Too often when we criticise structural failures, we project onto an individual garda. What we are trying to get to is how we should approach structural failures on a macro level. Resources should not come into it.

Also, down here we have a lot to learn from Northern Ireland. When this man committed a crime two weeks before he killed Shane, he was arrested, held in the barracks and brought to Newry Magistrates' Court the next day. Therefore, he was not out on bail causing more crime. He was arrested, held and brought to court, and he got a suspended sentence in Newry. Here, that could go on for two and a half years, where he would continue to reoffend and get bail, and then, at the end, hope for a reduced sentence because of the accumulation of many offences. We need the length of time between when an offence is committed and conviction to be much shorter.

I thank Ms O'Farrell.

I commend both Jim and Lucy O'Farrell on their dedication to their son's cause and all the advocacy work that they have done. It is really appreciated. The State has failed both them and their son, and we desperately need to learn the lessons to be learned. I thank them for their presentation today. I thank the other witnesses as well for their presentations.

There was a reference earlier to minor crimes. I am not picking on anyone in respect of this matter, but it triggered something in me. In my constituency, I am dealing with issues involving individuals who just happen to be juveniles who are consistently harassing people in a certain area, which I am not going to name. The victims of this crime are going through significant psychological trauma because of it. The harassment is happening every evening. Particularly during school holidays, it is becoming more and more of a problem. Again, the State is failing to deal with it, so much so that there are rumours of growing vigilantism in the area, which is very disappointing. As a democrat, I would fully and wholly condemn vigilantism.

As a former practitioner in criminal law, I note that when clients are presented to lawyers, they come accompanied with either a summons or a charge sheet. That summons or charge sheet potentially represents only one incident out of a whole series of incidents. If I consider the case of one of the juveniles who has been active in my constituency, I can tell the committee with certainty that there have been hundreds of incidents that, if considered cumulatively, would be taken far more seriously than an isolated public order offence or incident of criminal damage or whatever. Taken cumulatively, there is a huge impact, not only on Garda resources but also on the individual victims being subjected to the harassment, which is ongoing.

In the context of the point the witness is making about judges not having information, I believe from my experience that they largely do not have it. Gardaí might know something from intelligence but cannot present it to a court because it is not necessarily factual. However, it is known. There is a gap in respect of how bail is granted or refused based on a particular charge sheet or whatever evidence is given in a particular court. In my experience, it does not take into account the ongoing criminality. Do the witnesses from the Law Society or the Bar Council have any comments on that? Is there any area for reform that might be to the forefront of their minds?

That comes back to the PULSE system and the information that gardaí have. It struck me as the Deputy was talking that, in some cases, while a certain garda may be in a court charging a juvenile with an offence, he or she may not be aware of all the incidents concerning the juvenile because of the lack of information put into the PULSE system and, generally, because that information is not more widely shared with colleagues. The Garda member may be earnestly and efficiently prosecuting the juvenile or child before the court but may not be aware of the other issues because of the lack of information inputted into the system.

Again, it goes back to what was said earlier about the system only being as good as the information that is inputted into it. It does not seem that the relevant data is in there. If, when dealing with applications for bail and objections in court, all Garda members had access to the same information, there would be a consistency of approach. That is just not happening at the moment. The system is failing in that respect.

Does anybody else wish to comment?

We agree on the information piece. There is a programme for Government commitment to digitalise the Courts Service and bring it up to speed. There are other moves by the Department of justice to look at a unique identifier, which would go right through the criminal justice system so that people could be traced in an anonymous and protected way that would be data protection-compliant as well.

On the Deputy's point on what is happening in his constituency, that speaks to some of what the IPRT would propose or some of the solutions to this. When we talk about minor and non-violent offences, we know that what is most effective are things like bail supervision schemes. The bail supervision scheme in the youth justice system works extremely effectively. I have been before this committee before, and I am sure members are bored of me talking about it, but I will say again that it is extremely effective. The scheme deals with people in the community. They have wraparound supports from a multidisciplinary team. It is not that they are getting off.

We recognise the seriousness of the offences that people have caused and we do not excuse them. However, if we are ever to address and deal with them, and stop people from reoffending, we have to put in place a system that works. We know this scheme works. In 2019, it was evaluated by the Department of children. The evaluation looked at young people under the age of 18 who had completed the bail supervision scheme. It is mandated by the court and the young person can be referred by Oberstown as well. The scheme is operated by Extern, which is an NGO that now falls under the supervision of the Probation Service, and participants have to comply with their conditions. Very often what happens with people who are on bail and are given conditions that we would describe as restrictive is that they just cannot comply with those conditions because they are in active addiction or are homeless, or for a myriad of different reasons. This scheme helps them comply with those bail conditions, which means they are not out committing other offences. In the longer term, after six months, 72% of those young people who completed the bail supervision scheme were no longer offending. They were back in school or maybe in employment or Youthreach. They were back in the family home. Their younger siblings were benefiting from this as well and their parents were given parenting support.

What we would like, and what the Minister of justice has committed to, is to have a bail supervision scheme put in place for women. That was announced in last year's budget. We have yet to see it come to fruition. We would really like to see that. It works in other places and jurisdictions, for example, Scotland. The Department of justice made a recommendation back in 2022 to bring this in.

We all want more. We want safer communities and better societies. We want investment in communities, such as the Deputy's community, where these issues arise. Until we take a different approach, look at what investment is needed and have a redirection of justice investment into those resources, we will continue to see these issues come up and people committing further crimes while out on bail. We need to address that.

I acknowledge Shane O'Farrell, the son of Ms O'Farrell and Mr. O'Farrell. I acknowledge Lucia, Jim and all the O'Farrell family. As the Chair said, they are no strangers to many in these Houses, including me. What is even more valuable about their presence today is that they are providing information about and insight into the whole structural process.

The criminal justice system has changed over the past number of decades. Victims have a much greater say than they previously had. It is still not enough but the fact that victims are here as part of a deliberative process is useful as this committee carries out its work.

Ms O'Farrell is very clear about recommendation No. 7 of the Lorcan Staines report, which states: "The responsibility for the prosecution of offences should be removed from the Gardaí and all future Court proceedings should be conducted by legal professionals." Shane's story evidences the need for to have that recommendation implemented. I want to go through that with the Law Society of Ireland, the Bar of Ireland and the Irish Penal Reform Trust. The Commission on the Future of Policing recommended that this be done, as did Lorcan Staines in his independent review provided to the Department of justice.

Then there was a review by the Department of the Taoiseach. It has ended up with some kind of a reform model, I think they call it. Starting with the Law Society of Ireland and working our way through, what is the witnesses' understanding of what has now happened? What is the position of the Law Society of Ireland in respect of gardaí prosecuting versus the DPP? When we have had these expert recommendations, why have we not ended up in that space?

That is a question for the current Government, because to expand that service would require quite significant investment by the Department of justice. There would have to be solicitors on the ground in each county. As the committee knows, generally across the country, there is a State solicitor in each county. Some of the bigger counties like Cork, are split, with two State solicitors there, for city and county. The service is directed locally towards the Circuit Court and does not, in the main, deal with the District Court. To expand it to the District Court across the country would be a huge commitment. It does not seem to me that any examination of that by the Department of justice has taken place. Currently, there are difficulties with the Department of justice funding criminal legal aid and difficulties with cutbacks in that area and the current system that arises. It would require quite a significant investment by the Department.

Is it Mr. Mulchrone's contention that this was this a resource decision, ultimately?

I cannot answer to that. That is a matter for Government.

Your suspicion?

It would require a huge amount of resources and investment into the system. If there were to be counsel as well, dealing with certain cases, as the committee knows, the current practice is to have them retained on a panel. They are maintained and engaged on a case-by-case basis. It would require a huge amount of investment but it does not seem that any examination of that has taken place. That needs to happen first.

Does Ms O'Leary share that view?

Yes, I do. It was the case in the past that counsel appeared to prosecute in the District Court, but that has not been the case for a long number of years. Sometimes, in exceptional cases, the director will instruct a barrister to appear to prosecute in the District Court, but in the main, prosecution is either done by gardaí themselves, a State solicitor or a DPP solicitor. We would welcome an examination of that. It is a fact that while gardaí are using their best efforts, they are not legally trained and may not always be in a position to identify the information that should be put before the court, or deal with legal argument that might arise in the context of a bail application.

Ms O'Leary cannot speak about what was deliberated at this Department of the Taoiseach group. I do not know if the Law Society of Ireland or the Bar Council are even part of that. Can Ms O'Leary speculate? Are there any considerations other than resources the recommendations in the independent report by Lorcan Staines SC and those by the Commission on the Future of Policing in Ireland have not been implemented?

I am simply not aware. That is a question for the Department.

On that, they manage this in Northern Ireland. We are always a step behind the North. If they manage it there, we can manage it here. It is a matter of will, when we consider the importance of precious life and the facts being brought to the court. Now we have two recommendations, one from the Commission on the Future of Policing in Ireland and the report by Lorcan Staines SC. Even on a pilot programme, it should be commenced.

I think there is agreement across the board among the witnesses in terms of Garda court presenters being stepped down and then ultimately removed. Part of our research, which will be published later this month but we can give an advance copy to the committee members if that is helpful, identified issues, and Ms O'Leary alluded to it, with Garda court presenters, who are not trained lawyers, seemingly being confused between the O'Callaghan principles in section 2 and the issues around technicalities on what is a serious offence under section 2 versus the question of the seriousness of the offence under the O'Callaghan principles. We have findings in the report about that and we are concerned about it. We would also support the recommendation that Garda court presenters be discontinued.

I want to conclude on another issue that was raised. Did I hear correctly that 74% of people remanded on bail have either served their time, having been found guilty or are not guilty? Is there a breakdown between the not guilty and those having served their time in that 74%?

We received those figures from the Irish Prison Service, so the only data it collected is that those people left remand custody without having returned or been kept on to serve a sentence. There is no breakdown because it is from the Irish Prison Service, not the Courts Service.

The reason I ask is that Ms McCormack highlighted, albeit only in the criminal sense, the difference between minor offences and major offences, but some of the most chilling words for the O'Farrell family and other victims' families, which also undermine confidence in general in the criminal justice system, are when a news report says that somebody committed a crime while out on bail. It fundamentally undermines people's trust in the system. Aside from No. 7, which Mr. Staines identified in his recommendation, No. 1 was the sharing of information, which was a key feature in poor Shane's story. I know the Courts Service is beginning a unified case management system, or is close to doing so. Where are we on the journey towards a unified case management system at District Court and higher court level that talks to the PULSE system?

Can we ask for a brief response?

I am not aware exactly where the Courts Service is on that. It is a question for the Courts Service. It would require investment. The matter seems to be under review by the service. We would encourage it because the system could reveal contradictory bail conditions between one court and another. It is difficult for judges to operate knowing they are trying to impose robust bail conditions, while in another jurisdiction, district or Circuit Court they are on different terms. There has to be consistency. That is a serious matter in terms of investment in the IT programme. The courts and the Garda need to be speaking off the same set of facts and information.

I welcome the witnesses and thank them for taking time out to be here. In particular, I welcome Lucia and Jim. We are here because they lost their son in tragic circumstances. Again, I extend my deepest sympathy to them and the family and thank them sincerely for the work they have been doing for the past 15 years. I do not know how they have held it all together while dealing with the loss of their son in such tragic circumstances, found the strength within themselves to campaign for justice for Shane and done it in such a dignified and respectful manner. I have the highest admiration for all they have done to date. They clearly have done the State and its citizens a huge service. Unfortunately and tragically, the State did not do the same service to them and their family.

I have a couple of questions on where we are at the moment. Is it possible a situation similar to that which befell the O'Farrell family could happen today in any part of the country? An individual may be stopped along the side of the road by members of the Garda and may have previous convictions and be out on bail. If the gardaí stop and question the individual and suspect he or she may be involved in crime, what has changed in that regard since the O'Farrells' son tragically lost his life?

We are all here trying to protect citizens. Nothing can change now for Shane. Nothing can give him breath or make his heart beat even one beat but we can change things and make things better for the future. We need to look at the problem in order to fix it and find solutions. There were six years of an investigation by An Garda Síochána. Members should have access to that report - it has been refused to us - and see what the Garda found through its deep analysis over six years. Many of our complaints were about bail. That might shape the legislation going forward.

In our case, every single strand seemed to fail. Two warrants were issued by the Courts Service to An Garda Síochána two weeks before Shane was killed but they were not executed until after he was killed. He was in court a week before he killed and got a fine and walked down the steps, when there were two warrants out for him. He was pulled up an hour earlier by the drugs squad, and the driver was uninsured. The driver was a different person from Zigimantas Gridziuska. This man was in the driver's seat and was awaiting prosecution for being previously pulled up for having no insurance.

Ten days had lapsed, so he was awaiting prosecution but the car was not seized. To me, you could not write this. You could not make up the level of failure. There is a desperate need for root-and-branch change. It needs to be looked at deeply. The issue that is relevant to all of this is covert human intelligence sources, CHIS, or informers, as people might know it. That needs to be looked at in every town and village in the country. It depends on the narrative. Is it to develop a relationship with an informant or is it to quid pro quo for information received or information yet to be got as a down payment? The information is not being brought to the courts as it should be. We are an anomaly in Europe in that we have no legislation in this area. That should be done as a matter of urgency. We have been criticised for that.

I attended a conference of the Irish Council for Civil Liberties, ICCL, and I made a note of the following. We know there is no law regulating the use of covert human intelligence sources in Ireland. I understand from the ICCL that this makes Ireland an anomaly in Europe and that the management and use of CHIS is governed by a Garda policy which neither defines CHIS nor provides details about the circumstances in which such can be used. This is clearly insufficient. This cannot be seen as an independent oversight. Due to the possibility of significant human rights infringement related to the use of covert policing, an independent oversight role should be formalised in law.

At that conference Nuala O'Loan and John Wadham spoke. The recommendations on surveillance and covert intelligence they had for the Government of Ireland were:

In the context of compliance with the ECHR, [the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights] ICCPR and the principle of equivalence of rights in the Good Friday Agreement, the Government of Ireland should introduce legislation regulating the use of covert human intelligence sources (CHIS) in a manner which complies with the human rights safeguards found within Article 8 and the broader provisions of the ECHR to address the current lack of legal basis for its use.

That is very much tied into An Garda not prosecuting in the courts. I think they go hand in hand. After all the reports, it would be a great shame if legislation is not put in place. We should not be an anomaly in Europe and we should have legislation on informers. It is crucial that happens. If the members ask me what they can do as legislators, I would say they can get the six years of the GSOC report, study it and see what changes need to be made. It may guide their thoughts on that. That should be coupled with the Staines report.

Change needs to happen. I was looking through my notes last night of what to take and I came across a note about rates of recidivism from 13 May 2010, with details of how many murders, thefts, etc., were committed by people out on bail. Little did I know that a year later Shane would be part of those statistics. It also talked about lack of prison spaces and overcrowding, etc. I thought to myself that nothing has really changed in the 16 years since. If Northern Ireland can have solicitors and barristers prosecuting in court why can we not? Why are we always second class in these things? We should have a high standard of justice so there is respect for the people who go about their daily lives. We need a high standard of justice when bail conditions are set by the court. I was with Deputy Matt Carthy and Lynn Boylan in Brussels a few years ago. We had the privilege of speaking to a judge from the French criminal court. When he heard part of our case, he said that when a judge makes an order it should be respected. That is a very simple sentence but the judges' orders are not being respected. In Shane's case, we did not need new laws. We needed the law at the time to be implemented and it was not.

With these new recommendations, we could have a good, strong, robust justice system, where when a judge makes an order it is respected. The State has to show it is interested in it. If the State has no regard for the consequences of breaching a bail order, we can hardly expect the accused to have any regard.

I thank the witnesses for being here. As a non-legal person sitting on this side of the room, I am blown away by Ms O'Farrell's depth of knowledge, which she had to acquire due to the loss of her son.

What she has done for me as a layperson this afternoon is show us where the gaps are in plain English and clear understanding. None of us can dispute her level of knowledge. As I am sitting here, I am thinking about other families who are also impacted by unprovoked one-punch attacks, such as the Gallagher family and the Lynn family. These families lost people because there was a failure in respect of multiple bails in both of their cases - in excess of 20 cases each. I am trying to work out here where the dots are. We have all the reports and we have very smart people but there is a clear lack of a memorandum of understanding between the Courts Service and An Garda Síochána. Something is missing in how we share our data. It is as plain as day given how it has been explained. Something is lacking, be that ICT, and we can talk about the paperwork. Deputy Butterly said that a lot of paperwork is involved in all of this trying to get down through it. Regardless of whether it is ICT, there has to be a memorandum of understanding between the Courts Service and An Garda Síochána to be able to be able to share this information in a timely fashion. I do not expect Ms O'Farrell to answer but who can answer on that? Am I misreading this? Mr. Mulchrone is nodding.

It is an investment issue. The Department oversees the Courts Service and obviously funds An Garda Síochána and controls that budget. These are budgetary, finance and investment issues. I am looking at page four of Mr. Staines's report showing the executive summary. One of the top recommendations from his review is that there be significant and immediate investment in the information-sharing systems for An Garda Síochána and the Courts Service. This report was not published yesterday. It has been publicly available since it was shared with the public and it has been front and centre as the top recommendation. I cannot repeat enough here today that this is the area that needs attention and investment because judges are out there trying to make fair decisions and impose conditions that are measured and tempered in the current circumstances of a particular case, but if they are making those decisions when another bail bond in another jurisdiction potentially contradicts that, it is very unfair to the decision maker if they do not have that data in front of them. It seems a simple issue that can be solved quickly but it is a question for the Courts Service and the Department. Where are they with that investment? Where is the UCMS system that they are looking at in terms of the criminal justice system? They have introduced it for family law and that has seen some improvements but, again, criminal law is the laggard with regard to the investment that is required for the system to operate effectively.

Can we go one step further on that? We have seen how in respect of the HSE and An Garda Síochána or Tusla and the HSE, when we get there, agencies funded by HSE do not want to share the data. We are now into the next layer. We might have the ICT but now we have data breaches. Now we have how we communicate. That is another world in itself even if we have sorted out the computer side of it - one Department talking to another.

Within the Courts Service, if a person is on bail and has conditions of bail, that has to be adequately recorded. There is no question of that. The only current model as far as I am aware, and I do not work for the Courts Service, is that a bail bond is handwritten and prepared by the court clerk. It is then stored in the court file. Sometimes it is scanned to the computer system and sometimes judges are looking for copies of it and have to wait during the currency of a sitting to get that bail bond so that they can compare and contrast to make sure whether they think it is appropriate to admit the person to bail or what those conditions are and whether they have been complied with. It is all about the quality of the information that is available. I do not think data protection within the Courts Service would be an issue, especially when the service is the controller of that data and the service user is before the court again. It is about having a robust system that records simple data. Qualified legal professionals are reading that data. A judge or a member of An Garda Síochána can get a copy of it and the solicitors who appear before the court need access to that information.

It might have been Ms Brady who used the word "identifier" earlier. Where does An Garda Síochána sit, then, in terms of sharing? In this regard, reference was made to different jurisdictions.

There are votes in both the Seanad and the Dáil at the moment, so if-----

I will finish because I have a minute left.

The Senator may finish in a minute, and then we will suspend.

I just need to get into this. If there are identifiers and they are unique to the person in question, as I would imagine, is the identifier that goes up on PULSE the same as the one recorded by the Courts Service? Is it standard across the two?

I cannot speak to that because I have never actually had access to it. Access is controlled by An Garda Síochána.

Ms O'Leary is nodding.

Sorry, but I am just agreeing with Mr. Mulchrone in that we do not have access to the PULSE system. I believe gardaí create the PULSE identifiers-----

Can Ms Brady answer the question?

To clarify, the Department of justice is in the process of examining this and putting together a unique identifier so it can be used in both systems, but it is saying it is going to take a number of years to do that, given the antiquated systems it is dealing with. It is working on it. We met officials from the Department last year.

It should be piloted, at a minimum.

Yes. We should be considering investment in that and trying to prioritise it sooner rather than later.

It could be a recommendation for our report.

How does that figure if there is somebody with nine aliases?

I am not sure because I think they are going to put a unique number in place to try to deal with the data protection concerns. I am not privy to how exactly they are going to do it. They consulted us last year, but they were saying it was going to take a number of years to get this right. There will probably be public consultation down the line.

Did Senator McDowell want to make a comment? If so, he may do so very briefly.

Very briefly, I welcome Ms O'Farrell. She is a former client of mine. I know her background and agree with everything Senator Gallagher said about her.

I will make just two points. There is a miscellaneous provisions Bill going through the Seanad at the moment and the Minister has made provision for this. The contrast between saying it will take a few years to implement this and, for instance, the capacity of Garda patrol cars to see whether a car is insured or uninsured is fairly strong. If we are serious about something, we can get on with it. There is no doubt that the unique identifier is going to be the PPS number. Theoretically at any rate, it is going to ensure that, if there is an adequate IT system, the fact that a person is on bail in the High Court and is sought on a warrant in the District Court is always available to somebody who has access to the system. It is one thing to make provision for this in law; it is a wholly different thing to implement it. We have to keep pressure on the Department of justice to implement it.

I am sorry, but there is no time to allow a response to that. However, I will allow the Senator back in straight away after the break. We will suspend for about ten or 15 minutes.

I thank members and guests for their patience. Hopefully, we will not have any more interruptions, although we are running tight on time as a result. No members are indicating for the first round so I might just ask a few questions myself. Again, I thank the Bar of Ireland, the Law Society of Ireland, and the Irish Penal Reform Trust for being here. I have the absolute privilege to be in a position to facilitate Lucia and Jim here. Anybody who has heard Lucia's witness will know that she is not just speaking as a grieving parent, or as someone who has been desperately and tragically failed by the State, but also as someone who has become an expert in these matters. Her testimony will be very valuable to the committee when we are preparing our report on this subject. I know that Lucia, Hannah, Gemma, Aimee and Pia have put in a huge amount of work and effort, not only in identifying failings but also in bringing forward solutions. They have all been ably assisted by Jim every step of the way. Jim is a very quiet man but probably the strongest man I have ever met - I want to put that on the record as well - in terms of the quiet determination he has displayed alongside Lucia, who has often been the public voice of Shane since he tragically lost his life in 2011.

Lucia mentioned the complaints she had made to GSOC. From my understanding, the crux of those complaints actually lay in failings of the bail system. Would that be true to say? Perhaps she might be able to give us an update. This was a public interest report that GSOC was instructed to carry out by the Government. What is the status for your family, and by extension the general public, in actually seeing the final public interest report?

When Shane was killed I never knew of GSOC. I did not know what it meant. Our daughter knew something was not quite right and she made complaints. At that time, you had six months and now it is a year. She had six months so she lodged her complaints in January 2012, and two years into that we had not heard any conclusion to Gemma's complaints. Mr. Alan Shatter, the former Minister for Justice, ordered a report under section 102(5) of the Garda Síochána Act 2005 in the public interest. He ordered a public interest investigation. As I mentioned, this allowed GSOC to widen the scope of its investigation, if it saw fit, beyond the complaints that we had made. That went on for another four years, so it was six years with GSOC investigating this. It concluded its investigation and said that no criminal charges were being brought against the gardaí but they were going to look at a disciplinary ones regarding minor offences. A year later they produced another report, under section 97 of the Act. It is the first report, a section 101 report that was ordered by Mr. Shatter under section 102(5), which they spent six years looking at, that has been refused to us. It was ordered in the public interest but they are refusing it on public interest grounds.

They are our complaints. We invested hugely, not just emotionally. We got court orders from Belfast and Newry because six weeks after killing Shane this man was jailed in Maghaberry Prison, yet he was supposed to be signing on three times a week in the local Garda station. I said to the constable in Belfast, "No, you have got somebody else. You cannot have had him because he killed our child six weeks earlier and he would be spotted for not signing on at the local Garda station".

I told the constable in Belfast the station had somebody else. I thought it could not have had him because he killed our child six weeks earlier, and he would have been spotted for not signing on in the local Garda station. He said he was sorry to disappoint me but the station had him. We gathered all of the court orders and made applications. Jim brought me to Newry and we made an application in Newry Court for these court orders to assist the Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission in its investigation. We had a large number of documents. I went to the Clones Library, which has all the local newspapers, and looked through the microfilm to see various charges where he had stolen, it looked like, to feed his heroin habit.

At the end of six years, we expected that our complaints would be addressed. Lawfully, we should have those answers. However, we got a summary version called a 103, which is just to keep the family updated. It is a few pages. Eight complaints were listed, and above them, there was a sentence or two that did not answer the questions or complaints. We are now at the stage that we have to go to the High Court to seek the Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission report that was ordered by Mr. Shatter in the public interest.

I do not want to talk about any ongoing court case. GSOC is now Fiosrú. It has been changed. Outside of legal proceedings, because we cannot speak to them, in terms of the O'Farrell family's interactions with Fiosrú, is it fair to say there is a refusal to provide it with that document?

Yes. Fiosrú has refused it and said it is up to the court to decide. It is refusing on public interest grounds.

It refuses on public interest grounds to publish a public interest report.

Exactly. Many of our complaints were about this man breaching bail while he was on bail already, so many of our complaints are about that. It might help shape legislation going forward for the committee.

I would have thought that was the purpose of seeking the report in the first place. Ms O'Farrell has outlined very eloquently the reasons she strongly supports the recommendations of the Staines report in respect of transferring prosecutions and functions from gardaí to legal professionals. If I look back at the many debates in the House in respect of the case, which culminated in a Government apology that acknowledged that Ms O'Farrell and her family and, ultimately, Shane had been failed by the State, the thread that runs through a lot of those Dáil debates is the suggestion that it is possible that the person who killed Shane was actually an informant. I think that shaped Ms O'Farrell's view in respect of that particular recommendation. In terms of the legislation surrounding covert human intelligence source, CHIS, informants, what does she think that legislation should look like?

It has never been confirmed to us that he was a covert human intelligence source. We asked in the first few months after Shane was killed that our letter be sent to GSOC. It would not give us the report. We know there is a file on the person in the Garda National Crime and Security Intelligence Service. We have not had access to that file either.

Ireland has no law regulating the use of covert human intelligence sources and the lack of a legal framework makes Ireland an anomaly. In Ireland, the management and use of CHIS is governed by a Garda policy, which neither defines CHIS nor provides details about the circumstances in which covert human intelligence sources can be used. It is very worrying that we do not have legislation on this. I am a retired nurse so I have no idea about these things. Why do we not have legislation on CHIS if it is being used? It could be looked at under the Garda (Powers) Act and the Criminal Justice (Surveillance) Act 2009, but an internal Garda policy is not independent oversight of a covert human intelligence source.

There was criticism at the Morris tribunal for not having legislation. Why are we the only county in Europe that does not have it? Why are we always on the back foot on these things?

We need robust legislation. I am sure committee members, as legislators, will shape something going forward. We need that. If we are the only ones in Europe and out of step in this regard, we should have legislation brought forward.

We are running short of time. I will allow two-minute interactions if any member wishes to come back in.

Ms O’Farrell makes an extraordinary point about the absence of legislation and oversight when it comes to covert human intelligence sources. Perhaps the committee can look at and bring scrutiny to that scheme in a future session.

I wish to ask the Irish Penal Reform Trust a couple of questions regarding therapeutic bail, which has effectively disappeared, and the bail supervision scheme. Will the witnesses detail those schemes, because people might not be familiar with them? How could they make things a bit better if they were acted on?

I appreciate there are practitioners present who may also wish to come in on the question of therapeutic bail. It was a practice that evolved as a workaround to the fact that there is no formal diversion mechanism at the point of the pre-trial hearings for someone experiencing serious mental health issues, particularly those in need of serious psychiatric treatment with conditions such as schizophrenia or active psychosis. There is no formal mechanism for them to be diverted from prison at that point to go to a secure or community mental health facility. Therapeutic bail developed as a workaround. It was included in a bail condition that the person would reside or be treated in that facility. My understanding is that this has been halted because a judicial review was brought forward challenging it as a practice.

With regard to the IPRT’s position, the 2006 Vision for Change policy document recommended that therapeutic bail be put on a legislative footing in order for there to be a proper legislative mechanism to divert such people from prison in the first place. We are now seeing higher rates of people in remand custody who are in active psychosis or experiencing a serious, acute mental illness. Those people are being dealt with by the prison in-reach court liaison service, PICLS, which identifies those in need of care. They are then put on a waiting list to either go to the Central Mental Hospital, to have their fitness to stand trial assessed, or to be assessed for basic needs. Meanwhile, they are untreated and being kept in cells, rather than isolation cells, which was originally the case. On the D2 wing in Cloverhill Prison, where a lot of these cells are located, people in active psychosis double up in cells. A lot of committee members will have seen the case a couple of weeks ago where a man was stabbed in the eye by a fellow inmate who was in active psychosis. I cannot emphasis enough how much our research indicates that remand custody is being used as a safety net to catch all of the issues, particularly those relating to psychiatric care, that are not being dealt with in other services. We are really concerned about it.

I thank all of the witnesses. My question is for the representatives from the Law Society of Ireland and the Bar of Ireland. Figures from the Prison Service provided to the Irish Penal Reform Trust show that 74% of those remanded were either given time served or found not guilty. To put the question very simply, should more people be remanded on bail in our criminal justice system who are currently not being remanded?

It depends on the type of offence. Minor offences were referred to earlier. In certain circumstances, where a person has a recidivist tendency to commit multiple, repeated minor offences, there is a question as to whether those people will ultimately face some sort of custodial sentence as a preventative measure to prevent the commission of further crime.

That goes back to what the IPRT has been saying in terms of different sanctions and different availabilities for the courts to have those services available to them. The current recommendation in the Staines report is that bail legislation should be amended to expand the conditions that could be attached to the granting of bail to include obligations about attending counselling and addiction and employment services. If those were actually conditions the judges could attach to bail bonds to be actually workable conditions, perhaps there might be fewer people in custody, especially those charged with more minor offences. I do not have the data available with me to comment on exactly what the proportion of them is, but the 74% statistic is quite headline grabbing in the sense that, if that is the outcome of those cases, what were those people doing in custody in the first instance? Again, it speaks to whether the judge is left with very little option because those other conditions that could be imposed on a statutory basis are not available to the judge.

The figure sounds very concerning. I would like to see the data itself. I know the IPRT has said that the prison is not in a position to provide the full data. It is highly concerning that any person would be held in custody on remand for an extended period and ultimately be found not guilty. Unfortunately, in our system as it stands, there will be cases when that does happen but one would obviously hope they would be minimal.

In terms of no further penalty being imposed, it may be that a sentence is imposed, but because the person has been on remand, maybe the judge has measured the sentence to fit with the period on remand and that it was appropriate, in the judge's mind, that the person was held in custody for that period. It is difficult to comment specifically without having access to more of the data.

In terms of bail conditions, the Staines report proposes putting other conditions, or the potential to propose other conditions, on a statutory footing. My experience is that courts do impose conditions such as engaging with treatment programmes. It is in place already where there is an evidential basis for that because specifically the High Court would have full jurisdiction to impose reasonable conditions. If you do have individuals who appear before the court who are able to indicate they have therapeutic services available to them, etc., bail conditions can be put in place. Then we go to the second part of the equation which is gardaí being in a position to monitor those conditions and to obtain information from the centres an individual is meant to be attending to find out if he or she is in fact attending as required and providing urine samples for analysis to demonstrate they are drug free.

I thank Ms O'Leary. Nobody else is indicating. I want to get the members' agreement to publish the opening statements on the committee's website. I thank the representatives from the Law Society, the Bar of Ireland and from IPRT, who will have the best plugged report launch coming up on 20 July.

I sincerely thank Ms Lucia O'Farrell and Mr. Jim O'Farrell for everything they have done for Shane and for us in ensuring that whatever changes emerge in the bail system or the wider criminal justice system, it is not because we do not know what changes are required, because they have set out very clearly what they are. Their testimony, along with the rest, will feed in very strongly into the committee's report. I also thank those organisations and individuals who supplied the committee with written submissions, which will also be taken into consideration.

I thank everybody for taking part and the members for their deliberations. I ask for agreement we go into private session to consider a number of housekeeping matters. Is that agreed? Agreed.