Minister for Justice Helen McEntee has said she is happy to appear before the Oireachtas Justice Committee and discuss the violent events in Dublin last Thursday, but cannot accede to the committee's request for this to happen on Wednesday.

A spokesperson said she will be standing in for the Taoisech on Leaders Questions in the Dail on that day, as well as responding to a private members bill in the Seanad and completing the Recording Devices Bill.

The minister will engage with the committee to agree on another date.

Garda Commissioner Drew Harris has also been invited to appear at the Justice Committee on Wednesday.

Last Thursday, garda cars, a bus and a Luas carriage were set alight, shops damaged and looted and officers attacked during violent scenes.

It came shortly after three children and a women were hurt in the stabbing attack outside a school in Dublin's north city centre.

Opposition politicians have called for the resignation of Commissioner Harris and Minister McEntee.

Minister for Social Protection Heather Humphreys said she does not see the point in a motion of no confidence in Minister McEntee, adding that she believes Dáil time would be better spent debating legislation to introduce garda body cameras and the use of facial recognition technology.

Ms Humphreys said that she has "absolute confidence" in the Garda Commissioner and the Minister for Justice.

"She is doing a good job. Crime is changing and its difficult times that we are in, but we will address the challenge that we are being faced with," she said.

"I don't see what the point a motion of no confidence is. I’ve sat through the Dáil on many, many occasions with motions of no confidence. They achieve nothing.

"If we were spending our time bringing forward more legislation in terms of body cams, that I know that the minister is bringing this week, I think that that would be much more beneficial, and also the legislation on facial recognition."

Ms Humphreys said that what happened in Dublin "should not happen again" and described the action of those who rioted as a disgrace.

People 'do not feel safe' - McDonald

Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald has said people do not feel safe in parts of Dublin's inner city.

Ms McDonald repeated her call for Ms McEntee and Commissioner Harris to resign after rioting in the capital which followed a stabbing attack last week.

"The events were unprecedented, the viciousness of the attack on the young children and the childcare worker, and then the ensuing violence which was predictable, which was organised, which was not the first occasion upon which violence had been instigated by some of these elements," she told the BBC.

Ms McDonald added: "This is just part of a wider pattern that has been the reality for the last year, the last 18 months, in truth probably since the Covid lockdown.

"The truth is the minister and the commissioner have failed to resource the gardaí correctly, they have failed to bring forward plans for the safety of citizens.

"We now have a scenario where people do not feel safe in parts of Dublin's inner city - that includes children going to school, their parents and grandparents dropping them off, it includes people going to work, people who visit the city, and we are now at a point where the position of the minister and the commissioner are simply untenable."

A car on fire during the unrest in Dublin city centre last Thursday

Minister for Higher Education Simon Harris said a lot will need to change following events in Dublin last Thursday.

Speaking on RTÉ's Morning Ireland, he said that a full review and report will be carried out by the Garda Commissioner while number of measures, led by Minister McEntee, are already under way and more will now be escalated in order to deal with the situation.

"There's a number of actions around making sure we better resource and support our gardaí, continuing with garda recruitments to grow the number of gardaí in Dublin and across our communities, body cameras, looking at the issue of how we can get our guards to use technology so it can speed up the time that it takes them to have to review CCTV," the minister said.

"And then also legislative change to make sure that when people do commit a crime, particularly attacking a guard or a frontline worker that there are longer sentences."

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Labour's justice spokesperson Aodhan Ó Ríordáin said the Government "failed spectacularly" to prevent the "entirely predictable" violent events in Dublin last Thursday, adding that his party had "no confidence" in the Government given its ongoing failures over the past five days.

He said ministers talking about introducing dog units, horse units and water cannon was a deflection from what was actually required - increased Garda numbers, increased Garda patrols in the capital, and a Government information campaign to counter the "poison" across social media.

He said Labour would not put down a motion of no confidence in either Ms McEntee or the Garda Commissioner as it would take away from these long-standing issues which have not been dealt with.

Mr Ó Ríordáin added that if Sinn Féin was serious about a no-confidence motion then "they would have done it already."

Incident was 'entirely predictable'

Green Party TD for Dublin Central Neasa Hourigan said she does not know how she could vote confidence in Minister McEntee, when the situation on Thursday night was "entirely predictable".

Speaking on RTÉ's Today with Claire Byrne, she said that this is not a Dublin inner city problem but a country wide one.

"I don't know how I can vote confidence in the minister when for weeks, if not months, I have been interacting with people on the ground here saying there's something going to happen," Ms Hourigan said.

"This is bad. Can you please take a different approach?

"If we focus on the far right, and a more interventionist approach and on community development and dealing with things like homelessness and poverty and addiction, then we can get out of this, but we can't police our way out of it alone."

Meanwhile Fine Gael Senator, Barry Ward, said Facial Recognition Technology (FRT) is nothing more than a tool to allow the gardaí carry out searches more efficiently.

He was speaking after the Government said that it will enable FRT in order to prosecute offenders for riot and violent disorder, in response to last week's riots.

Later today workers will gather in Dublin city centre in a show of solidarity following last week's violence an unrest.

The Irish Congress of Trade Unions is calling on workers in the city to assemble at 1pm at the GPO on O'Connell Street.fhele

Additional reporting: Samantha Libreri, PA