Willie O'Dea (Limerick City, Fianna Fail)
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44. To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Justice and Equality the number of burglaries that were reported in Ireland in 2022; and to provide a county breakdown of the numbers. [18082/23]

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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I very much understand that burglaries can be traumatic and invasive. They can leave people feeling unsafe and uneasy in their home and community. They very much impact people’s sense of security in their home.

The Deputy will be aware of Operation Thor which tackles burglary and actively targets organised crime gangs and repeat offenders through co-ordinated crime prevention and enforcement activity based on intelligence and the latest burglary trends. Since the operation’s inception in 2015, there has been a sustained reduction in burglary nationwide, on which I commend the Garda. The Garda is rightly scrutinised. This is an area of enormous success by An Garda Síochána.

The overall reported level of burglary in 2022 was 45% lower than pre-Covid-pandemic levels of 2019. The last comparable pre-pandemic year was 2019 and reported burglaries are down by 45%. That is as a result of the sustained intelligence-led approach by the Garda. I pay tribute to it for its concerted efforts, including a recent focused policing operation which resulted in 40 people being brought before the courts and charged with a total of 60 offences, including burglary and associated crime.

I also take the opportunity to draw attention to the Garda crime prevention advice under Operation Thor, which is highlighted through public information campaigns and by Garda prevention officers who do a great job across the country engaging with communities, including the "Lock up, Light up" campaign.

An Garda Síochána also has a free property recording app. Should any items be stolen, the app provides a way of reporting this to An Garda Síochána and gives the public the option to share information with the Garda for this purpose.

As the Deputy will be aware, the Department of Justice provides funding to Muintir na Tíre to cover the costs incurred by community groups in administering the text alert scheme. The text alert scheme enables communities to set up a group to receive alerts advising them of suspicious or criminal activity in their area. As well as ensuring awareness among users of the service, it can also lead to them reporting suspicious activity to the Garda. I encourage anybody watching these proceedings and all Deputies to make their constituents aware that further information on the property marking app, text alert schemes and other crime prevention information can be found on the Garda website, www.garda.ie.

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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We will absolutely support the Garda in resourcing Operation Thor, in recruiting gardaí and getting more gardaí on the streets and rolling out the community safety plans in every county in Ireland in 2024. The numbers show a stark improvement. Every burglary impacts on a person or family. I do not dismiss in any way the significance of that individual trauma and loss of a sense of security. I will give some figures for Cork. For example, in the Cork city Garda division in 2019, the last year before the arrival of Covid, there were 484 burglaries and last year it was 268. In the Cork north Garda division there were 232 burglaries in the last pre-pandemic year and 134 last year. In the Cork west Garda division, there were 99 burglaries in 2019 and 69 in 2022. These are reductions of 44%, 42% and 30% for each of those three divisions respectively, which is good progress. It is down to a combination of things. The intelligence-led operations are genuinely identifying big organised crime gangs and bringing people to justice. I commend the work the Garda is doing with communities with, for example, text alerts. We cannot do enough in that space.

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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I do not want to drown the Dáil in statistics and yearly comparisons. I just make the point that we try to compare the last year before there were Covid restrictions which was 2019 - last normal year - with 2022, the first year without Covid restrictions. During the pandemic years when everyone was at home with lockdown periods and the likes, that obviously had a downward impact on much criminal activity for a variety of reasons. There can always be local and regional-specific reasons from time to time. We can see burglary trends in a certain direction. Through Operation Thor, the Garda tries to respond to those trends through the deployment of additional resources.

I think the Deputy will agree with me that key to this is increasing the size of the Garda force, enabling the Garda Commissioner to have more men and women in An Garda Síochána who can be deployed in every part of the country, including in parts of Cork so that we can see an increase in community policing, presence on the streets and engagement with the community. That will be our priority for this year and next year.