Garda staffing and policing technology
Senators debate electronic tagging, number-plate recognition and Garda recruitment, while warning that retirements and redeployments leave rural counties, including Louth, short of officers.
I join my party’s acting leader, Senator Mark Daly, in calling for the tagging of those criminals walking the streets every day who have been remanded by the courts. As he pointed out, it would cost very little money compared to what it would cost to hold them in the prison system. As I have stated on several occasions, smarter policing is the way to go. A good start to that would be the introduction of the number plate identification system across the country. This system would tell whether a car was registered, taxed, insured and its NCT was up to date. It would also make it easy to identify whether the plates were cloned, a car had been stolen or used by criminals for an illegal or attempted illegal act. These are matters on which we can make progress relatively quickly. Will the Acting Leader impart that information to his colleagues in the Government?
I welcome the recent announcement by the Minister for Justice and Equality that her Department will spend money on the acquisition of new high-powered Garda vehicles, as mentioned by Senator Paschal Mooney. On Tuesday last, Senator Terry “The Scoob” Brennan welcomed that allocation of money and the 230 odd high-powered vehicles that would be purchased, in addition to the 300 already purchased, allegedly. This will bring it up to almost 600 Garda vehicles. The question I want to put to the Acting Leader and Senator Terry “The Scoob” Brennan is: who is going to drive these vehicles? Garda numbers have depleted.
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I cannot believe what I am hearing.
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The recruitment has to be welcomed. If one takes into consideration that, on average, the 500 gardaí who retire on an annual basis are not being replaced, the numbers coming out of the college in Templemore will not even cover this in two years.
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Does the Senator remember why we could not replace them?
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It is welcome that the Minister is allocating extra gardaí to County Louth to combat criminality.
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From where are those gardaí coming?
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They will be coming from counties Cavan and Monaghan. That is not acceptable.
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We will have wait until there is a tragic incident involving a member of An Garda Síochána in our county to get them back. It is not acceptable.