Mr. Ronan Slevin:

There has been none. We have raised this issue with the Minister. We raised it at a previous sitting of the committee. It used to always be the case that members joining An Garda Síochána viewed it as a career and part of the reason was the pension. Members had to stay for the last ten years to get the benefit of the pension because those last ten years counted for two years each. Due to the nature of the job and the demands of shift work, members were allowed to retire after 30 years instead of 40 years, as applied for others in the public service. The new pension scheme, which came into force in 2013, has become an average scheme whereby what you put in is what you get out. On top of that, when you reach your retirement age, which is 60 years of age or after 30 years of service, you cannot retire because your pension is worth €10,000 or €11,000 and you are unable to access the old age pension until you reach the age of 66.

We have been seeking that a member be able to access the old age pension, that is, the occupational supplementary pension or pre-old age pension, once he or she hits a minimum service of 30 years or reaches 60 years of age.

There is nothing there to make it a career. People now view it as part of a career. There is nothing stopping a member of An Garda Síochána joining, getting the degree from the Garda College, doing a couple of years and then moving on to another form of public service that is nine-to-five with pension benefits and with fewer dangers in the line of work and fewer complaints risk the loss of one’s job. There is just more protection with those jobs. People are not staying in An Garda Síochána like they used to. It is not a career any more, unfortunately.