Alan Farrell (Dublin Fingal, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

While we have done the closure of rural Garda stations to death, I am conscious of Mr. Toland’s background experience in the UK. Comparatively speaking between ourselves and the United Kingdom in size and population, we have a massive number of Garda stations. I listened to Mr. Toland’s comments on people’s perceptions as opposed to his own and the fact we have a Victorian network. In my opinion, it has no place in our policing plans in terms of the maintenance and upkeep of X number of stations across this State when we do not need anything near that. Perception has actually governed policy for decades, which is wrong. What is Mr. Toland’s view on this?