Niall Collins (Limerick, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

To tie up some loose ends in that regard, it is important to bear in mind that many of these are part-time Garda stations, so to speak, and the members of the public do not buy into the notion that in leaving a Garda station open the Commissioner is committing resources to manning the station. The effect on the ground is that these are part-time stations open for a limited number of hours per week. It is important to impress upon the Commissioner that this impacts on many communities, particularly on rural communities by virtue of the dispersal of population across the country. The comparisons to Scotland cited are not valid because of the demographic spread but a point I must air is that people believe there is a withdrawal of services from rural communities. People appreciate that a garda sitting behind a desk may be better deployed out on the beat, and that is accepted by all of us, but unfortunately we have seen in other areas of the public service, not just in this area, a withdrawal of services into larger towns and villages and that is a serious concern to rural Ireland. The Commissioner put his finger on it in terms of the cost because the buildings are owned by the Office of Public Works and effectively what he is left with is a day-to-day running cost which does not register on the financial scale in terms of the issues being discussed in this committee regarding the wider economy. We want to impress upon the Commissioner that it is a policy which the public does not like or agree with and it is my job to bring that to his attention. Many of the members of the Commissioner's force do not agree with it either. I referred earlier to consultation with communities but some of the members of the force believe they have not been consulted. That was brought to my attention and I was asked to bring it to the Commissioner's attention which I am doing now. In that regard, consultation is key to this process.

We had a discussion recently at our joint policing committee, JPC, on the potential redrawing of the districts within the Limerick division, which I am just using as an example, which concerns people. There is talk in Limerick of the Askeaton division, for example, being subsumed into the neighbouring divisions and I am sure that is being examined in other areas of the country. Issues such as those must be aired at JPC level in each authority in a manner which will help inform public representatives and communities as to the rationale. Most of us live in the real world in terms of the way the Commissioner must make ends meet, and we appreciate the constraints he is under, but in terms of the part-time stations that is having an impact on communities. The mere presence of a garda in the station gives people a sense of security and comfort in terms of the threats posed to those communities.