Garda Síochána (Powers) Bill 2026: Report and Final Stages
Seanad Éireann — 2026-06-17
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Michael McDowell (IND), National University of Ireland

Amendment No. 2 seeks to delete lines 16 to 19 on page 11 of the Bill, as amended on Committee Stage. Those lines refer to "A person of whom a requirement under paragraph (c) of subsection (2) is made". The paragraph in question - section 11(2)(c) of the Bill - provides that a garda may "require the driver to be in or on or to accompany the vehicle, as may be appropriate, for so long as is necessary to complete the search". Section 11(4) of the Bill, which we are proposing to delete, refers to "the purposes of section 15 ", which, as we will discover when we read section 15, is another way of saying for the purposes of committing an offence. Section 15 provides that a person who "shall be guilty of an offence" will:
be liable—
(i) on summary conviction, to a class A fine or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 12 months, or to both, or
(ii) on conviction on indictment, to a fine not exceeding €30,000 or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding 5 years, or to both.
The latter provision makes it an arrestable offence.
Let us read section 11(4) again:
A person of whom a requirement under paragraph (c) of subsection (2) is made shall, for the purposes of section 15 [in other words, to determine whether he or she has committed an offence], be considered to have failed to comply with that requirement where he or she, at any time while the requirement is in force, is not in, on or accompanying the vehicle in relation to which the requirement was made.
I need to get a clear indication of what is being talked about here. For the purposes of determining whether a person has failed to comply with a requirement, and for the purposes of criminalising them, they will be deemed "to have failed to comply with that requirement where he or she, at any time while the requirement is in force [whatever that means] is not in, on or accompanying the vehicle in relation to which the requirement was made". I have to say I do not understand that. I think I know what it is driving at, in that if a person walks away from the car, they are deemed to be failing to comply with the requirement to bring it somewhere so that it can be searched. I think I understand that, but that is not what this subsection says. It does not say that. It says that a person will be deemed "to have failed to comply with that requirement" if, at any time, they are not in the vehicle. That is bad drafting, again. It really is. If the Minister is bringing this to Dáil Éireann, he should have another look at that because I would not like his Bill to be laughed out of court or Dáil Éireann. If, at some stage, a person gets out of the car, they are deemed to have a committed a criminal offence if they have been required to drive the car to a place where it can be inspected. That cannot be right, and it is badly drafted.
I know what it is driving at. I think the draftsman in the Attorney General's office could come up with a better attempt to achieve what the common-sense view of it is probably intended to achieve. Let us be clear that this section actually says that the driver is required to be in or on or to accompany the vehicle, as may be appropriate, for so long as is necessary to complete the search. We are talking here about somebody who has had a requirement made of them. Such a person is deemed to have failed to have complied with it if, at any time while the requirement is made, he "is not, in, on or accompanying the vehicle". If he goes to use the bathroom in a pub near where the thing has happened, he has committed an offence because he has refused to comply with this requirement. It is not well drafted - that is all I would say. That is the reason I have proposed its removal in its present form.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-06-17/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:55:04+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-06-17