Frances Fitzgerald (Dublin Mid West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Deputy Collins asks about the visibility of police throughout the country. Key to achieving that goal is the commitment in the programme for partnership Government to continue the ongoing accelerated garda recruitment programme. Templemore had been closed but the last Government made a decision to open Templemore and begin a process of continuous and ongoing recruitment. There is agreement in the programme for Government on accelerating the recruitment programme to bring the numbers up to 15,000. A total of 700 garda recruits have already gone through Templemore and a further 440 have been planned for this year. We will need to accelerate that later in the year but this will depend on the capacity of Templemore and that is being examined with the authorities in the college. We would like to begin to increase the numbers as far as we can but this will depend on resources there.

We do not want to reduce the quality of training as that is very important. When large numbers were going through Templemore, as was captured in the O'Higgins report, the training of recruits and, particularly, the supervision of young gardaí leaving Templemore, were lacking so we want to ensure that when recruits leave Templemore they have access to supervision in the training stations around the country. An accelerated programme of recruitment of trainee gardaí is essential to ensure a visible policing presence. We have commitments to double the Garda Reserve, an issue which the Deputy has raised with me a number of times, so that they can act in a supportive local role as well.

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