Pádraig Mac Lochlainn (Donegal North East, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I have received feedback from officers both in an urban setting and in two rural settings. The feedback is that they are seeing less capacity to do their job and these gardaí are very frustrated. There was a wave of burglaries in Donegal but I am thankful there was a special operation to tackle that. We met the assistant commissioner and I applaud the Garda because it very quickly got on top of the issue, albeit with additional resources deployed on a short-term basis. That did the business.

I urge the Minister to engage with representative associations. I appreciate the Croke Park agreement issue and the Minister knows our position. We are not happy that those at the high end have not felt the same pain as those on the front line. We could go back and forth to argue about whether the Garda Representative Association should have been part of the talks. It has indicated it was never at the table. Somebody has failed the ordinary gardaí and those on the front line, with low morale, will take another hit on take-home pay. We must do something about it because there is a crisis of morale. If these people do not feel they have support in these Houses, it will bring consequences.

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