Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Given Fine Gael's disastrous handling of policing and justice and the reduction in the number of gardaí we have also seen in County Donegal, whether you look at the figures from 2002, 2012 or the past three years the numbers for our county have gone down. On top of that more than one in ten is out sick. These are either people who have been assaulted or injured in the course of their duty, or are suffering from sickness themselves. There is a serious issue there. We then have the situation in Gaeltacht regions. People are entitled to be able to communicate and carry out their business with the gardaí in Irish. An Garda Síochána has recognised this with an aim for all Gaeltacht stations to be bilingual and all vacant posts are deemed Irish essential. As I said, that is not the scenario we currently have, in particular when there are vacancies, people are out sick, moved, transferred or promoted internally. Can this issue be raised with the Garda Commissioner? There are people looking to be transferred to Gaeltacht regions who have proficiency in the Irish language to make sure we fill the obligations of the State and the Constitution, which is that people in Gaeltacht regions should be able to conduct their business with An Garda Síochána in their native language.

See this speech in context