James Browne (Wexford, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputy for raising this important matter. A key pillar of the Programme for Government - Our Shared Future is building stronger and safer communities. I can assure the Deputy that the Government is committed to ensuring there is strong, visible community policing right across Ireland, both rural and urban.

To this end, the Department has secured an unprecedented budget of €1.952 billion for An Garda Síochána for 2021. This level of funding is enabling sustained and ongoing recruitment of Garda members and staff. There are now some 14,600 Garda members and more than 3,000 Garda staff nationwide. Budget 2021 will allow for the recruitment of up to 620 new gardaí and an extra 500 Garda staff. There will be continued investment in the Garda fleet of €8 million in addition to the highest ever investment, of approximately €15 million, in the Garda transport fleet in 2020, a proportion of which relates to the Garda Covid response.

Although An Garda Síochána has provided very dedicated service by assisting in the national effort to combat the threat of Covid-19, ordinary policing has, of course, also continued throughout the period. The Deputy will be aware of Operation Thor, which is designed specifically to tackle the increase in the number of burglaries and associated criminal activity that usually occurs in the winter months by undertaking targeted enforcement and preventative activity. This year's winter phase of Operation Thor began on 1 October 2020 and will run until the end of March 2021. This initiative, which also features the Lock Up and Light Up public awareness campaign encouraging homeowners to protect their homes through the winter months when burglaries tend to increase, has led to a very significant and sustained decline in burglaries and property-related crime since its introduction in 2015. I am pleased to state that I have been informed by the Garda authorities that incidents of residential burglary have been reduced by 41%, to 52,816 incidents, while non-residential burglary is down 31%, to 19,672 incidents, in comparison with the equivalent period before the operation began.

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The Deputy may be interested in the work of the national rural safety forum, which brings together An Garda Síochána, my Department and the Department of Rural and Community Development, alongside national and local organisations including the Irish Farmers Association, Muintir na Tíre and the GAA. The purpose of the forum is to develop a nationwide network for the distribution of crime prevention advice, to increase engagement within communities and to prevent and reduce opportunities for crime. This year, the Department has committed in the region of €150,000 to local communities that wish to apply for a rebate towards the costs associated with running their local text alert scheme, which is administered by Muintir na Tíre. This is a continuation of the annual funding made available by my Department for the text alert rebate scheme each year since 2016. More generally, I can advise the Deputy that the Department has for many years provided funding for the employment and associated costs of the national community alert programme, including the employment of regional development officers. These development officers provide support to community and text alert schemes and offer advice on how to establish new schemes.

As the Deputy may be aware, on 13 November the Minister, Deputy McEntee, announced that the Department will pilot three local community safety partnerships in Dublin’s north inner city, Longford and Waterford. These partnerships are the structures proposed under the new community safety policy of my Department to take a holistic approach to safety issues in partnership with the community. The pilot schemes will operate at local authority administrative level and will be made up of local representatives, a range of local services, community representatives and residents. Local community safety partnerships will take a strategic approach to their work in order that issues arising can be dealt with in a co-ordinated manner and addressed collectively by relevant service providers in partnership with the community.

It is welcome that the pandemic itself has had a notable impact on rates of burglary over the course of this year. Residential burglary has fallen in 2020, with a sharp reduction observed in March and April in response to the public health restrictions on work, travel, school and business. From March to August, inclusive, there were 43% fewer residential burglaries reported compared with the same period in 2019.

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