Eugene Murphy (Roscommon-Galway, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister for her reply. It is good to hear the announcement of that figure going up to 300. We on this side of the House might have had a little say in that. It is significant. However, I want to go back to the main point here. As I said to the Minister, 11 reservists in the Roscommon-Longford district is the second lowest in the country, and that is down seven, from 18 in 2014. I acknowledge what the Minister has said to us, but there has been very little done with the Garda Reserve. I am looking here at the Garda Inspectorate report Changing Policing in Ireland, which was published before last Christmas.

It pointed out that despite receiving considerable training, reserves are not consistently or strategically utilised for operational purposes. Furthermore, the inspectorate pointed out there was no identified champion for the reserve programme within the Garda.

Given the huge drop in the number of reservists over the past two years, it is important to have somebody within the Garda to take on that role and deal with it. The reservists have an important role to play. We often see members of the Garda Síochána trying to help out communities at different events - a major festival, a funeral or whatever. The role of the reservists in helping out members of the Garda Síochána, who have much more important things to do, is very important.

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