Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú) | Oireachtas source

According to the Minister's response in the past week, Garda recruitment and is at one third of what was pre Covid. The Minister opposite should not use the figures from the pandemic as his baseline to show so-called improvements. He just admitted that Covid distorted the figures significantly. The other point is that for every year the Minister for Justice has been in office, the number of gardaí has fallen. That is an incredible record.

The Minister referred to issues relating to garda bodycams. Cameras do not and cannot make up for having sufficient Garda personnel. The direct link between the number of gardaí and people's behaviour is significant. That cab be seen in the context of what is happening on the roads. A reply to a parliamentary question I tabled to the Minister for Justice showed that there has been a 36% reduction in the number of gardaí policing the roads in recent years. That is an incredible fall in the number of gardaí minding the roads. At the same time, there has been a significant increase in the number of deaths on the roads. It stands to reason that if people feel they will not come across a Garda checkpoint or meet a garda on the road, unfortunately, their behaviour changes. As a result, we have seen an increased number of crashes on the roads. There is a link between recruitment of gardaí and life-and-death situations in this country. The Government is not making a material difference in respect of that issue at present. When will it start to recruit more gardaí, protect the welfare of gardaí and make sure that the terms, conditions and wages of gardaí are at a level whereby we will be able to recruit young people into force?

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