Richard O'Donoghue (Limerick County, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome this legislation, which will reduce bureaucracy and enable Garda to be more robust and agile when dealing with crime. I understand the Bill proposes to free up gardaí so that we will have more front-line staff. I also welcome the leaner management structure.

Newcastle West is the largest county town in Limerick yet its Garda headquarters is in two areas. Administration is handled in Askeaton 20 km away and all phone calls from members of the public are diverted to the control room at Henry Street from 9 p.m. to 7.30 a.m. Despite covering an area of more than 40 square miles, we do not have a Garda station. The whole thing is all over the shop. This is not satisfactory. The Newcastle West district extends from Croom to Abbeyfeale and everything in between but it is not open on a 24-7 basis.

When will the new Garda station project in Newcastle West commence and, more important, when will the station open? Will we have a Garda station by 2025? Can the Minister put a time limit on it so that the people of Limerick and the surrounding areas will have a Garda station of excellence that will work for them? In the meantime, can we have a more suitable building in Newcastle West that would serve the people of east and west Limerick?

A point I would like to raise, one which was also raised by Deputy Cathal Crowe, is the number of investigations ongoing in the Garda in Limerick. We have eight gardaí suspended for two and a half or three years. Not one of them has been replaced so Limerick is down the eight gardaí who are under investigation. As Deputy Crowe correctly stated, over 60 phones have been confiscated and 160 investigations are pending in Limerick.

The Minister might be able to answer the following question. When the gardaí were trained in Templemore, were they informed that they could use an "L7" or "a square" in exceptional circumstances and show discretion in hardship cases? Every garda whom I have spoken to in and outside the Limerick division has been trained and taught to use discretion. The terms used for this discretion when they were being trained were "an L7" and "a square".

Is that no longer the case? Do gardaí have discretion in hardship cases any more? Three years have been wasted on investigations of misdemeanours that gardaí were actually trained to do at Templemore. We are now prosecuting gardaí for doing the job they were trained to do. I am not condoning any garda breaking the law outside of that context. Any garda who does so must be prosecuted, but I am not in favour of wasting taxpayers' money and spending years upon years without gardaí on our streets in our towns and villages just because a garda did the job the way he or she was trained to. Surely the crimes that are being committed on our streets are more important. Antisocial behaviour, racist abuse and drug-related crimes are at an absolute high. Suspensions in the Garda should be dealt with effectively and promptly, not after two or two and a half years.

Recently, I cycled with Little Blue Heroes. We had with us Garda Superintendent Aileen Magnier of the Newcastle West district. We were there to raise money for Little Blue Heroes. It was a Garda community project. Everyone was there - gardaí, the fire service, the crime response unit and even the Garda band. It was to help a charity for children in need. We can get things right. Gardaí work with people in the community and they should have discretion. They should not be penalised. It needs to come to an end this year.

We have new legislation and are working on the situation. We should draw a line in respect of people who were trained previously and move forward. When it comes to regulations for building or the NCT, we work forward from the day they are implemented. We do not penalise someone for something that was not against the regulations at the time. Let us get this situation sorted out, get our gardaí back on the streets and stop making them suffer for doing something they were taught to do.

See this speech in context