Réada Cronin (Kildare North, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The reason I asked is that in Kildare, my constituents really want to know this. Kildare used to be the county with the lowest number of gardaí per head of population. We have now been passed out by Meath. Kildare is now the second worst. Communities need gardaí, and they need to see gardaí out and about.

Does the Minister of State have figures for how many gardaí in Kildare were deployed to Dublin on that awful Thursday night, 23 November? There is a real concern that new gardaí that do come to Kildare might be sent to Dublin as some kind of a sop in the hope that it will get the Minister for Justice, and indeed the Garda Commissioner, off the hook, while in Kildare we desperately need more gardaí. We need them to be visible. Only two of the Garda stations in north Kildare, Leixlip and Naas, are full-time stations, while Kilcock, Maynooth, Celbridge and Clane are all part-time stations. We really need to have enough gardaí in Kildare.

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