Joe Flaherty (Longford-Westmeath, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State. I appreciate that the programme for Government has an ambitious target for the growth of garda numbers nationwide but Garda strength fell from a high of 14,500 in 2009 to 12,800 in 2014. It is great that we will have 450 new officers coming out of Templemore this year. I emphasise that a significant number of those new officers need to be deployed in rural Ireland, specifically in counties such as Longford.

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