I call Deputy Jim O'Callaghan who is taking Leaders' Questions on behalf of his party for the first time.

I am indeed. I thank the Ceann Comhairle.

We learned yesterday that the Garda Representative Association, GRA, had voted to take industrial action on four days in November. This is an unprecedented development which will have serious consequences not just for the Garda force but also for the public. Unlike other workers, gardaí do not have the right to strike. The reason for this is they are responsible for the safety of the State. An Garda Síochána has always served the State with great pride and its members take an oath to defend the public and the State, but their decision to strike shows that there is rampant demoralisation and anger within the force. This has happened in the past few years. Like other public sector workers, gardaí have faced pay cuts and a reduction of 2,000 in their numbers since 2009. In addition, more than 100 Garda stations have been closed.

The Government has been aware that an industrial relations issue has been brewing in the Garda for some time. It has been in place for five months and one of the biggest issues on its agenda is public service pay and industrial relations problems within the public sector. In recent months deals have been done in respect of low grade entry nurses and teachers and allowances for firefighters, yet the Government only entered into what it thought was an agreement with the GRA late last Friday evening. It is to be regretted that the Government, unfortunately, has stumbled and stalled in dealing with the challenges facing An Garda Síochána.

We spend many hours in the House discussing and critiquing the performance of An Garda Síochána, whether it be through reports from the Garda Síochána Ombudsman Commission, GSOC; the Policing Authority, the Garda Inspectorate or commissions of investigation. Do the Tánaiste and the Government recognise that all of these reports and critiques will be meaningless unless we have a Garda force in which morale is good and in which gardaí feel valued by the State and have a sense of pride in their work? Morale is low because of members' terms and conditions, for which the Tánaiste still has responsibility. The Commissioner, GSOC and the Garda Inspectorate are not responsible. The grievances of gardaí have not been treated seriously by the Government.

In the confidence and supply agreement my party entered into with Fine Gael it was agreed that a public service pay commission would be established. When will it be established? Can the Tánaiste give a commitment to the House that the Government does not intend to allow a Mexican stand-off between the GRA and the State? Will she re-engage with the GRA? What is her plan to resolve the dispute?

I agree that members of An Garda Síochána are essential and pivotal to civilised living in this country. They protect individuals in communities and never know the day or the hour when they may be exposed to violence or asked to make the ultimate sacrifice. The Government views An Garda Síochána as a key strand in Irish life and is committed to supporting it in every way possible.

As I said in my statement yesterday, I am disappointed to hear of the GRA's rejection of the agreement which was reached with the Department last Friday and in which we addressed a range of issues. I am also disappointed to hear of the announcement that it is to take industrial action. The agreement addresses in a very positive way many of the issues raised by the GRA in the course of negotiations which, contrary to what the Deputy said, have been taking place for a number of months. In the past four months there have been detailed negotiations between my Department and the representative associations and agreement was reached with the AGSI. The agreement seeks to address, in particular, the concerns articulated about the pay of new recruits, the additional hours gardaí are required to work, access to pay determination and resolution bodies and the completion of the review of An Garda Síochána. The Department has yet to hear officially from the GRA, although its concerns have been articulated in the public arena. The outstanding issues can only be addressed through engagement between the parties and my Department which continues to be available to address them. To facilitate that engagement, I want the GRA to set out to us its outstanding concerns about the agreement. Everybody in the House agrees that it would be most unfortunate if, rather than engaging, further action was contemplated which would not be in the best interests of communities or An Garda Síochána.

The AGSI has also raised a number of issues about the public service pay commission, something about which the Deputy asked and which I will address. The Government recognises that members of An Garda Síochána, like all public servants, played a very significant part in stabilising the public finances and bringing about economic recovery. They were subject to the same reductions as all other public servants during the financial crisis and, similarly, have benefited from the partial restoration of pay commenced on foot of the Lansdowne Road agreement.

I fear that the Government does not yet realise the significance of and danger attached to yesterday's announcement. We, as legislators, and Ministers, as members of the Executive, cannot allow a situation where members of An Garda Síochána see themselves as having no option other than to go on strike. The legal system in the State is dependent on members of An Garda Síochána being available to the public and in the community to enforce the law. If they break the law and go on strike, it will put the legal system in an extremely serious position. The Minister is the person with responsibility to resolve the dispute and six weeks are available to the parties involved to resolve it before the first day of strike action. We hope that what happened in the dispute between Dublin Bus and the bus workers' union will not happen in this case. It is imperative that the Government becomes involved to resolve the dispute which is more important than any other industrial dispute. The grievances of members of An Garda Síochána need to be recognised and dealt with by the Department in the talks.

I am in no doubt about the seriousness of the situation. That is why my Department has engaged very intensively with the GRA and it is absolutely open, as am I, to meeting to resolve the outstanding issues. It is in the interest of everybody in the country. It is in the interest of An Garda Síochána, as the Deputy rightly said, and of the legal system across the board. Of course, we wish to ensure that we can resolve this. However, it is important that we find a pathway towards pay resolution and restoration. I heard a representative of the GRA say that this morning. It is imperative that we find that way forward and I believe we can. We have shown good faith in the discussions that have taken place already. A range of issues was on the agenda and among the areas addressed in those talks were: the lifting of the increment freeze, backdated; the restoration of the rent allowance; promotion opportunities to be increased on a pro rata basis with increasing Garda numbers; review of An Garda Síochána to be completed by the end of the year; commitment to review the appropriateness of voluntary overtime; no overtime this year and, by agreement with the Garda Commissioner, in the course of next year and the following year; and a range of other items on the table. There is a very serious commitment to examine the issues.

I will conclude by pointing out, and I know this particularly well because I meet so many gardaí in the course of my work, that we know how much gardaí suffered as a result of the economic meltdown. The financial problems of a garda married to another garda were doubled. As in the case of other public servants, the Government is committed to finding a way forward. On the question about the public service pay commission, the closing date has passed for submissions from various bodies. The Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform has had the consultation process and will make a statement shortly on the establishment of that commission.

I will follow up on Deputy O'Callaghan's question and remain on that topic. We have heard much about the economic recovery from the Tánaiste and other Ministers and while there is some recovery under way, it has yet to trickle down to many members. Many people have suffered as a result of the austerity that was imposed in the State over recent years and there is no argument about the level of austerity imposed on public sector workers in particular. Gardaí are no different from anybody else in that context. There have been pay restoration demands from various sources, including nurses, teachers, Luas drivers and bus drivers, all of whom have engaged in some level of industrial action over recent months. The Garda is in a unique position in that regard. What was announced yesterday is unprecedented. Nobody inside or outside the Government should take lightly what was said by Pat Ennis of the GRA yesterday. If anybody is naive enough to believe that the GRA will not proceed with the four days of withdrawal of service it announced yesterday, it would be a huge mistake.

We have a situation with the pay demands and the restoration demands. The Tánaiste said the Department is open to further negotiations. I am glad about that but I believe the Tánaiste must proactively engage with the GRA. The GRA indicated yesterday that it is willing to return to the negotiating table provided there are real and tangible measures from the Government for resolving this. Everybody wants to know what the next step is. Is it a wait and see game on the part of the Tánaiste? Is she waiting for the GRA to come back to her or will she actively engage with the GRA, as of today, to try to resolve this before 4 November?

I have made it clear that both I and the Department want to re-engage. After many hours of discussions we concluded the negotiations late last Friday evening with an agreement, as we understood it.

That was with the leadership but it was not accepted by the broader group, as has been obvious through media reports and interviews in the past number of days. We have not heard anything formally from the GRA and we await hearing about the particular issues it wants to see considered. There will certainly be no grandstanding about who approaches who first. The important point is to get back into discussions and see how we can negotiate.

Of course, this must be put in the context of the overall public pay situation, as the Deputy rightly says, where 280,000 public servants have an agreement that is in operation and that has been worked through with the Government. A total of 20 unions have voted their acceptance of it. A number of unions, including the GRA, have not accepted it and the deal has not been concluded. It is my intention and that of the Government to do everything possible to ensure that the negotiations can start again, that the items on the table can be worked through and that we can find a pathway forward. This is what is important.

No one person or country is going to recover overnight from the kind of economic meltdown seen in this country where recruitment and investment stopped and where we saw lower numbers of gardaí around the country. Why was that? It was because there was no investment for a number of years. What has this Government done and what did the previous one do? They started re-investing in people in Templemore, in vehicles, in the tools the gardaí needed and in ICT. The Government has shown its commitment to An Garda Síochána. Look at the recent budgets in terms of the initiatives we have taken. Clearly, we want to deal with the issue of pay in so far as we can under the constraints that are there at present and that are well understood by everyone in this House.

They are very well understood but I do not think it is simply a matter of saying that we do not have the money to resolve this. There is only one way this will be resolved. It will be resolved in the same way that every other dispute has been resolved, namely, around the negotiating table. The quicker we get back to that, the better. We certainly do not want to waste the next six weeks trying to resolve this. I am glad that there will be no grandstanding because this will escalate even within the next six weeks. We know that the AGSI will have a special delegate conference to discuss this matter. Time is of the essence.

The Tánaiste spoke about the deal concluded by the Government with the management last week and which has now been rejected. I spoke to one garda this morning. One thing that really stuck in his craw was the issue of the rent allowance of €4,000. New gardaí are coming in on salaries of €23,000. This is not a case of me sensationalising the issue. I am sure the Tánaiste is well aware of it. Gardaí speak to her as frequently as anyone else in this House, probably more frequently. New gardaí are earning €23,000 and do not have that allowance and are being forced to sleep in their cars. That is not acceptable. I do not think it is fair of this Government to use an allowance like that as a quid pro quo bargaining chip in any negotiations.

The issue of the rent allowance was raised by the GRA and was a key demand made by it, particularly relating to new recruits. Contrary to what the Deputy said, I am quite sure the rent allowance will be welcomed for new recruits. It was an important support for new recruits in terms of finance. That was something the GRA put on the table. We were able to negotiate to a point where it was available. I think it would be a support for new recruits.

The Lansdowne Road agreement is flexible enough to allow for the concerns of recent recruits in the public service to be addressed in a negotiated way. I agree with the Deputy that we are speaking about a negotiated way forward. That is what has happened. We have seen that happening already in respect of the TUI and the AGSI, notwithstanding its more recent concerns about the public service pay commission. Of course, it is through sitting down and negotiating that this can be resolved. I am very clear, as are most Deputies, about the hardship people in this country have endured and the sacrifices they have had to make.

Gardaí are certainly within that group. It has been very difficult for them. The economy is recovering and we want to make sure that they, as well as other public servants, get the benefit.