There have been seven murders in north Dublin in recent months. Four of these killings were of men aged 22 or 23, including the latest murder. One of the 22 year olds was shot in the head by a gunman as he was pushing his baby son in a buggy. Some of these young men were not believed to have been involved in gangs, except that they owed them money.

Alongside the murders, there has been a succession of attempted murders as well as well-documented evidence of intimidation and severe violence carried out by criminals involved in drug selling. There have been other high-profile murders in other parts of the city and in Meath and Louth. Seven killings in one year is an extraordinary level of violence on the northside of Dublin. If there was this level of killings elsewhere, I genuinely believe there would have been a swifter reaction.

There is a serious problem with how some of these killings are now reported. It is repeatedly reported that people are being murdered in a gangland area. Will the Taoiseach confirm to the House today and to all of us that no part of this country is controlled by gangs, that we do not have gangland areas or no-go areas for the Garda in maintaining peace and order in this land? We cannot have a situation where murders are somehow diminished because the term "gang" or "gangland" is attributed to the incident. We must not be allowed to become so used to violence that we are undermined in our determination to take absolute and robust action to stop criminal murders.

Specifically, we need a ministerial task force for Dublin's Northside Partnership area with the same level of commitment as was given to the north inner city ministerial task force, chaired by Mr. Mulvey. Such a task force needs to engage with all stakeholders and all members of the community, including political parties, community organisations and activists, businesses and so on. Crucially, it is essential that it looks beyond just a policing solution and also focuses on issues of employment, educational disadvantage and all the other factors that have in the past created fertile ground for criminals setting up networks or expanding their violent activities.

My question is very direct and simple. Will the Government undertake to establish such a ministerial task force for north Dublin? Does the Taoiseach accept what has happened in this specific area, and I do not want to hear statistics about crime or things being diminished, demands a co-ordinated and specific response from Government?

I agree with the Deputy in his assertion and comment that we should not use the term "gangland" to refer to any part of our country or any part of our capital city. There are places where crimes occur and those crimes may involve gangs, but it is pejorative to suggest that entire area is therefore gangland. I know large parts of my constituency, including Blanchardstown, where I grew up, is often referred to as gangland. It is no such place. It is a decent place with a decent community and decent families, and just because crimes or murders may occur there does not make them gangland. The same applies to Darndale, Coolock, the north-east inner city and other parts of the country. The same also applies to referring to criminals using the terms of comic book heroes, which glamorises them and should not be done either by us or by people in the media. Deputy Coppinger or somebody else also made that case very strongly yesterday. We as politicians and the media need to be mindful of those sorts of terms.

The north east inner city project is one in which I am involved, one I know well, and one about which we often talk during Taoiseach's Questions. There have been some very positive outcomes from that, and while it has not yet, as Deputy Maureen O'Sullivan has pointed out to me on a number of occasions, resulted in a decrease in crime in the area, it has resulted in many good outcomes. It was a unique approach, one that required many resources, both personnel and financial. I am not sure if we are in a position to replicate that in many other areas. There have been calls for a similar approach to be taken in Coolock and Darndale. There have also been calls for a similar approach to be taken in Ballymun, in the Inchicore-Kilmainham area, in Tipperary town, and in other places.

While I am certainly open to considering how we might do that, when we do something unique, targeted and well-resourced in one area, because of the fact that it is unique targeted and well-resourced in one area, when we try to do that in five, six, seven, ten or 12, by definition and common sense, it is a diminished approach. We need to look at it in the round to see if there are a certain number of areas we can identity in the country that are areas of significant disadvantage and significant crime, target those, assess them on an objective basis, and perhaps take five or six and have a special approach to them and do it in that way rather than one thing after another being called for and us not being able to put the personnel and the resources behind it, if that makes any sense.

I welcome the Taoiseach's openness to consider it. When the original north inner city task force was established, it was to see how we could have an integrated template to make a substantial permanent difference in a particular community, but it was not understood then that it was going to be a once-off initiative. I pointed out yesterday there are seven areas in this city where unemployment is north of 30%. We need to have specific, bespoke, integrated solutions for these areas so that we simply are not talking about general figures for our unemployment being 5% and all is well. We need to drill down.

I ask the Taoiseach specifically about the number of gardaí, because it is an issue that is coming up again and again. People want to see the visible presence of gardaí in our communities, and community policing is a critical focus of the reform agenda.

Why was this year's intake to Templemore Garda college reduced from the Government target of 800 to 600? Why did the Government reduce next year's target to 700 in the recent budget?

As I mentioned earlier, we are securing unprecedented resources for the Garda. Next year it will have a budget of €1.8 billion-----

That is not nearly enough.

-----which will be invested in more gardaí, better ICT and more vehicles.

The Government reduced its recruitment target.

I am coming to the answer to the Deputy's question. There are now 14,200 gardaí in An Garda Síochána, which is more than it has had for a very long time, as well as 2,900 Garda staff. I am confident that we will meet our target of 21,000 by 2021. A decision has been made in consultation with the Garda Commissioner, and taking into account the recommendations of the Commission on the Future of Policing in Ireland, to recruit more civilian staff. By doing so, we have been able to move about 500 gardaí who were largely doing administrative-based desk jobs into front-line policing. That is what people want. Instead of the previous approach of taking on more gardaí without reforming the Garda organisation, we are bringing more civilians into the Garda staff, thus freeing up hundreds of gardaí for front-line policing operations. Approximately 500 gardaí have already been freed up in this way. We are ensuring that there are more gardaí on the streets, in vehicles, on bikes and in communities where people want to see them, both by recruiting more gardaí and by reforming the Garda. I support the Commissioner's work on this. Bringing in more civilians will free up gardaí to move into front-line duties, and restructuring the Garda regional structures will result in fewer chiefs and more everyday policemen.