Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Even in a very wealthy country, and this is a wealthy country, there is only a certain amount of money. When we approach full employment, there is only a certain number of people who can possibly be recruited into the public workforce or the private workforce. Notwithstanding that, the Garda budget is at an all-time high of €1.7 billion and extra recruitment is happening every year. We reopened Templemore after it was closed by a previous Government and have been recruiting ever since. In fact, 200 more gardaí will come out of Templemore next week. We will continue to see an increase in the number of gardaí over the coming years.

The Garda Commissioner makes a decision on the balance of recruitment between sworn officers - gardaí - and civilian staff. He took the decision, instead of having 800 sworn officers, to have 600 sworn and 200 civilian staff because for the Garda Síochána to work as a modern organisation it also needs to take in civilian staff working in specialist areas. The increase is still the same but the balance is different. A modern police force probably needs to have more civilian staff so that it can free up gardaí to do police work.

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