Alan Shatter (Dublin South, Fine Gael)

In fairness to both, the Garda involvement was a great deal more intensive and required a great deal more personnel, overtime and allowances for the many members of the force who were engaged to be collated. That is more complex when compared with the Defence Forces, where the financial backdrop is simpler and clearer. Both forces did us proud during the course of both visits. We should take great pride in their performance. We should take great pride in the fact that both visits went so well. Given the possibility of visits by other dignitaries in the future, or even by the Queen and President Obama again, it is important to state that if there were not a small group of malcontents intent on disrupting the visits and on spoiling the enjoyment of many people in Dublin who would like to have had greater engagement with our visitors, a great deal of this money would have been saved and could have been used for other purposes. In circumstances of financial stringency, I think that is worth repeating. If there is a similar visit on future occasions, I hope there will not be the level of threat from these groups, which existed during the course of these visits, that requires this level of intense security.

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