Results 20,941-20,960 of 40,550 for speaker:Joan Burton

Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2013)

Joan Burton: The Commissioner has addressed those issues. I will return to the issue of the North because comparative policing and its success in different countries and regions both in the EU and in different parts of this island is an important factor in this debate. What is important in modern policing is that gardaí are involved in front-line duties. The PSNI inherited 140 stations but by...

Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2013)

Joan Burton: Studies on crime levels in different areas are very important. All the wisdom relating to modern policing both in the US and Europe is that it is critical to get police officers out on the front line and Operation Fiacla is a very good example of that. Where it has been operating around the country, it is taking into account changes in crime patterns brought about by additional mobility due...

Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2013)

Joan Burton: I thank the Deputy for his question. To begin with his first point about domiciliary care allowance, I answered a question about this a few days' ago, as the Deputy noted. I am happy to repeat to the House that the waiting period for domiciliary care allowance - the Deputy has the statistics in the answer to his question - has been reduced to six weeks following the reforms of the IT...

Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2013)

Joan Burton: We must examine as a nation how we develop modern policing which addresses the fact that criminals in this and other societies have developed their methods as the roads system has developed.

Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2013)

Joan Burton: Deputy Willie O'Dea raised the issue of people travelling out from town on a bus to rob a rural area. He is the one who raised it, so why would he complain?

Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2013)

Joan Burton: I am providing you with a response which is specific to the issue you raised. Garda management has been overseeing an important operation called "Operation Fiacla".

Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2013)

Joan Burton: I am very surprised that Deputy Willie O'Dea does not seem to be aware of the work being done by the Garda right around the country and that he does not support its professional work.

Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2013)

Joan Burton: Over the 12 months to the end of the third quarter of 2012, the recorded incidence of aggravated burglary fell by 17%. Does Deputy Willie O'Dea understand that Garda management has put in place a comprehensive operation in Operation Fiacla to reduce this kind of crime and that the operation is working?

Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2013)

Joan Burton: The operation has reduced the reports of aggravated burglary by 17%.

Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2013)

Joan Burton: That does not mean that people are not fearful or that if someone's house is invaded by a burglar, it is not traumatic.

Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2013)

Joan Burton: Good policing is what we want and it is what Garda management is providing. The use of modern policing techniques is the reason the reported incidence of aggravated burglary has fallen.

Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2013)

Joan Burton: Deputy Mary Lou McDonald is correct to state that under Fianna Fáil's proposal Garda numbers would have dropped to 13,000 by 2014 on foot of the deal on a cut of 10% which that party signed off with the troika.

Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2013)

Joan Burton: She was also correct to state that when the Garda Representative Association's spokesman spoke out against the cuts, the response of Deputy Niall Collins, who is now Fianna Fáil's justice spokesman, was to seek to have him silenced. Deputy Niall Collins called for the outgoing president of the Garda Representative Association, Mr. Michael O'Boyce, to be removed from the force by the...

Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2013)

Joan Burton: At the end of this process, we will have more than 560 Garda stations which is significantly more per capita than in Scotland or Wales. If we look north of the Border, 40% of police stations are to shut.

Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2013)

Joan Burton: We are talking about a relatively small but important number of stations which will be open for limited service of two to three hours in rural communities. Sinn Féin agrees with closing stations in the North.

Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2013)

Joan Burton: Sinn Féin Assembly and Northern Ireland Policing Board member, Pat Sheehan, said those stations represented "a drain on resources". At the time of the announcement, Alex Maskey, also a policing board member, said many of the stations on the list were an unwanted legacy of the past and had become blots on the landscape.

Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2013)

Joan Burton: We might well look for consistency and coherence on policy. We can agree North and South on the need for more effective and better quality policing which takes into account the change in crime patterns caused, in part, by easier access to the countryside. People want to see - and the Garda Commissioner has committed to - an end to circumstances in which gardaí are forced to spend...

Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2013)

Joan Burton: It is what we all want to see. This means targeting resources as effectively as possible to ensure there is better policing to protect communities and, in particular, older people living in isolated areas. It is very possible to achieve that with the development of modern policing methods. In my own constituency, which includes many semi-rural areas, Operation Fiacla has made a significant...

Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2013)

Joan Burton: I listened carefully to what Fr. Cusack had to say yesterday in the Redemptorist Church in Dundalk. He spoke very movingly about the trauma experienced by anyone, whether they lived in a rural area or a city centre, who had ever been subjected to a robbery or an invasion of his or her home space, particularly robbery with violence. Fr. Cusack spoke movingly about that experience. In the...

Leaders' Questions (31 Jan 2013)

Joan Burton: The Deputy brought it up. Everyone on all sides of the House is aware that it is possible for individuals or groups involved in crime to move rapidly from one part of the country to another. For this reason, the Garda has undertaken a special operation to target those involved in such crimes which, I suggest to the Deputy, not only affect the rural areas about which he speaks but all...