Garda Síochána (Recording Devices) (Amendment) Bill 2025: Second Stage
Seanad Éireann — 2026-05-27
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Michael McDowell (IND), National University of Ireland

I welcome the Minister to the House and welcome this Bill entirely without reservation, except that it may lean too far backwards in restricting the use of these methods to assist An Garda Síochána. I fully accept that European law is a constraint in this matter.
I merely wanted to put on the record of the House that it is now more than 20 years since I went, with the then Commissioner of An Garda Síochána, to the United States of America and inspected CCTV systems run in Chicago and other places to reduce crime in those cities. We provided, in the 2005 Act, for the use of CCTV by An Garda Síochána and by local authorities, and then we ran into the activism of the European Union, which began to restrict, under data protection law, the use of data in a way which has very seriously handicapped the use of a CCTV system, even when a local authority wants it as a general measure to discourage criminality. One only has to think of the Graham Dwyer case to see that the EU has thoughtlessly said that data which an Irish telecommunications company used to retain for civil law purposes for six years should not be available, except up to two years. These are foolish and unnecessary restrictions. To be honest, I have always thought that if my privacy is intruded upon by the Garda being able to look at my phone records for two years back to see who I have been contacting, I do not see how my civil liberties are dramatically changed if that period is six years.
Especially in relation to subversion and very serious crime, that was a foolish mistake. I put on the record my full support for the Minister on this matter and my regret that he cannot go further, for instance, to prevent graffiti being put up. These are not serious offences, but somebody should be able to use CCTV in some places to stop people defacing streets in circumstances like that. Insofar as this Bill goes, it has my total support.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-05-27/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:55:00+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-05-27