If we really want to reduce crime, we have to invest in the educationand welfare of disadvantaged children right from birth, writes CarolCoulter, Legal Affairs Correspondent.
There is overwhelming evidence to suggest most crime is linked to poverty, social exclusion, educational disadvantage and dysfunctional parenting, often all combined.
In order to prevent crime, therefore, the first task is to eliminate, or at least limit, the conditions that produce it. A 1997 report to the US Congress on what works in reducing crime identified a number of measures, including frequent home visits from nurses and other professionals to infants under two, weekly classes from teachers to children under five, and family therapy for at-risk older children.
Various early intervention schemes have been launched here, but they are invariably of a "pilot" nature, and have made no serious inroads into patterns of deprivation.
Early school-leaving has been identified as a risk factor for offending, but there are no systematic supports for those at risk of dropping out of school. The Northside Partnership has done valuable work in arranging supports to help disadvantaged children stay on it school. Most of these children are the first in their families to receive second level qualifications. But again this is only one initiative in a sea of need.
Then there is the long-running saga about the lack of places in secure units for children who have already fallen into anti-social behaviour, and need help to get out of it.
Most of this has little to do with the criminal justice system or the Department of Justice. Other Government departments, like the environment, social welfare, education and health have responsibility for neighbourhoods and families. But they see no relationship between their areas of responsibility and crime.
This is acknowledged by the Minister for Justice. "I can see all the social exclusion arguments very clearly," he told The Irish Times. "But departmental government is organised in vertical lift-shafts. In virtually all areas where responsibility is shared it's doubled."
The first step towards preventing crime, therefore, is to have a Cabinet sub-committee charged with drawing up a strategy to eliminate, as far as is possible, the conditions that produce it. If such a committee can work for insurance, it should be possible for crime.
There is little evidence the political will is there. No major political party is committed to the sort of redistributive policies that would have a real impact on marginalised communities. Instead they all focus on the end result - the criminal behaviour of elements in these communities - and on how to contain it.
Even with this limited objective, there is international experience about what works. The same US study found that extra policing in high crime hot-spots did help. So did job-training for older male ex-offenders, rehabilitative programmes for offenders and imprisonment for high risk and repeat offenders.
Yet here about 350 probation officers supervise some 7,000 ex-offenders, while the ratio of prisoners to prison officers is one to one. This year's Estimates saw a reduction in the real allocation for the probation service, though Mr McDowell said this might change if savings are made in the Department.
The US study found very positive, but not conclusive, evidence about the effectiveness of drug courts, improved training for bar staff, restorative justice schemes and the police showing greater respect to those they arrested.
What it found counterproductive was the arrest of juveniles for minor offences, drug-prevention classes in schools that focused on fear and neighbourhood watch programmes.
A British Home Office study also found "designing out" crime opportunities was effective, along with proportionate and consistent punishment, and, again, respect for the individual from the police.
This is endorsed by Prof Dermot Walsh, of the University of Limerick, who said the attitude of the Garda Síochána to certain sections of the population contributes to their unwillingness to cooperate in the prosecution of crime. "The gardaí see them as on the other side of the divide. There is no effort to reach out," he said.
The Patten report on policing in Northern Ireland deals at length with relationships between police and communities, and is applicable here too. The National Crime Council has already proposed local policing partnerships and the Minister has endorsed a limited form of this, with local elected politicians involved.
But the attitude of the gardaí to the most marginalised sections of the community must also be tackled at the highest level within the Garda Síochána, with a policy of recruiting from these communities, providing educational supports where necessary. It is equally valid for the immigrant communities now growing up in Ireland, who will have their own crime problems.
Gardaí who come from within working class heart-lands, or ethnic minorities, would also be in a position to infiltrate the criminal gangs and obtain good intelligence on them. But for this to happen the image of the force would have to change from the GAA-playing, mainly rural-origin force it is perceived to be.
There is room for improvement also in the processing of cases. The time between arrest, charge and the hearing of a case should be reduced so that an accused is not hanging around for months, if not years in cases of murder, waiting for the case to go on. That means the allocation of more judges to the Central Criminal Court.
Jury reform is also needed. At the moment the Juries Act permits the middle class to largely abstain from participating in juries. This should be changed, and provision made for jury protection where necessary.
In the words of Dr Ian O'Donnell of UCD's Institute of Criminology, our justice policy should be based on "good quality evaluation, with a willingness to adjust policies in the light of the evidence," not more of the failed policies of the past.