Fianna Fáil's law and order manifesto, informed by the continuous emphasis placed on crime during its five years in government, emerges as the most cogent of the main parties' policy documents on the subject, writes Jim Cusack, Security Editor

The principal difference in the crime proposals of the major parties is that Fianna Fáil envisages a major expansion of the Garda to tackle the perennial problem of public order policing and countering juvenile crime.

After years, even decades, of circling around the problem, it is now thought sufficiently serious to warrant a major increase in policing. The proposed additional 2,000 gardaí will take the annual Garda budget to well beyond €1 billion, probably within the next year.

In its 1997 election manifesto, Fianna Fáil proposed the expansion of the Garda to 12,000 and has delivered on this promise. Its promise to double prison spaces and stop the "revolving door" syndrome of early prisoner release has also been met.

These measures have contributed significantly towards a drop in crimes such as burglary and robbery, the first such drop in more than 20 years.

The Fianna Fáil manifesto appears to build on this experience and suggests that the way to tackle increasing street violence and juvenile crime - from a strictly law and order perspective - is to put more gardaí on the streets.

Gardaí, naturally enough, agree. They point out that in the early 1990s, as problems of car theft, street violence and serious crime were spiralling out of control, governments actually envisaged closing most of the Garda stations in Dublin at night.

Gardaí point out that much of the present juvenile crime and street violence occurs during the "valley" period between 2 a.m. and 6 a.m. when Garda numbers in the city are at their lowest and the Garda helicopter is out of service.

The perception of Dublin and other provincial city centres being dangerous places during these hours has become the focus of public concern about law and order in the past year or more. It would appear from its manifesto that Fianna Fáil has been sensitive to this level of public concern.

By contrast, the two other parties' manifestos lack any major or imaginative proposals to address the concerns of parents and young people affected by this build-up in street disorder.

The Fianna Fáil manifesto appears to recognise that governments can't have it both ways - promising to be tough on crime but not providing the resources to carry out the promise.

The Fine Gael and Labour manifestos seem set in the early 1990s mindset where promises without substance are made at election time.

Fine Gael and Labour, whose last administration came under heavy attack from Fianna Fáil over law and order, have shied away from promising a major expansion in the Garda.

Both their manifestos seem caught between the two stools of wanting tough action against crime while wanting to impose greater restraints on the Garda as a whole for the corruption and indiscretions of some officers, such as those suspected of illegal activity in Donegal.

Neither of the Opposition parties fully explains how it would be "tough" on crime while maintaining the current strength of the Garda and imposing rigorous new accountability structures.

Fianna Fáil is opposed to the notion of a Garda ombudsman along the lines of the Police Ombudsman in Northern Ireland. This is possibly due to the perceived demoralising effect some of the Northern Ireland Ombudsman's controversial actions have had on policing, particularly in the area of public order. In the North police officers have been arrested and questioned after incidents where they have intervened to stop serious street violence.

Labour's policing policy proposes taking the "accountability" mechanism of an ombudsman further by imposing an additional layer of oversight administration between government and the Garda, in the form of a Garda Authority, independent of either the Garda or the government.

As with the Labour Party, Fine Gael proposes the establishment of a Garda ombudsman along the lines of the Police Ombudsman in Northern Ireland.

The Fine Gael proposal also includes provision for the establishment of a Garda inspectorate which would be attached to the ombudsman's office.

The outgoing Minister for Justice, Mr O'Donoghue, made detailed proposals for the establishment of an independent Garda inspectorate under the direction of a retired judge. Under these proposals the inspectorate would encompass both the functions of a police inspectorate - like Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC), which ensures that policing standards are up to scratch - and those of an ombudsman in that it would be able to investigate independently complaints against gardaí.

The inspectorate proposals also go further than the Northern Ireland example in that the inspectorate could carry out investigations into alleged wrongdoing, whether or not there was a complaint from the public.

Legislation for the establishment of the Garda inspectorate is at an advanced stage and it could be in place by early next year if support for it continues in government.

Of the three manifestos, Fine Gael's seems the shallowest in terms of strategy and specific measures and in places even seems muddled. This is unusual, given the party's tradition of conservative, hardline law and order thinking. Fine Gael's manifesto contains at least two proposals for prison reform - for a prisons inspectorate and a parole board - which are already largely in place.

The Prisons Inspectorate, under retired High Court Judge Mr Justice Kinlen, was announced by the Government in February and began work last week. The Parole Board, under the chairmanship of the Limerick solicitor Mr Gordon Holmes, has been in place since April last year.

The single element of the Fine Gael manifesto which seems to advance either body is that it proposes they be established on a statutory rather than a non-statutory basis. Prison sources were uncertain yesterday as to what difference this would make to the basic workings of either body.

There was also some confusion about Mr Noonan's statement in a television interview on Sunday night that the Republic had an unusually high number of young men in prison. The Republic's prison population ratio is about a third less than that of Scotland, its nearest and most comparable region.

The Labour proposal that prison terms for prisoners, other than those convicted of serious violence or sexual assault, should be "spent after five years" is apparently based on a National Economic and Social Forum report in January. This report was largely endorsed by the Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, at the time.

Garda sources say that such a policy - which Labour says it intends to include in a Rehabilitation of Offenders Act - might be very unpopular with the courts as well as with gardaí.

Two instances in which offenders received lengthy sentences for non-violent crime were the heavy sentences imposed on convicted drug traffickers Eugene Holland and John Gilligan, both regarded as major criminals and members of the gang involved in the murder of journalist Veronica Guerin.

Fine Gael also apparently seeks to reverse the effect of the recent Supreme Court ruling in the Abbeylara case when it found against the Oireachtas committee of inquiry in the case brought by 38 gardaí who felt they could be legally compromised.

The Supreme Court found the committee had no right to make findings of fact which could affect the careers or lives of witnesses.

Fine Gael also appears to have fallen into the trap of promising legislation for minimum sentences for certain types of violent crime, such as assault and car theft.

The Minister for Justice, Mr O'Donoghue, made a similar promise in respect of drugs crime and introduced legislation imposing a minimum 10-year sentence for anyone arrested with drugs worth over £10,000 (about €13,000). Embarrassingly for Mr O'Donoghue, the courts ignored his legislation.

A similar fate could be expected for Fine Gael's minimum sentence proposals.