Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank Senators for their questions and also for their support for this Bill. As I said at the outset it is quite technical. At the same time it is an important Bill in making sure that the many changes that are taking place across An Garda Síochána and the restructuring, are rooted in the law, that gardaí are supported and enabled to do their work and that it is as effective as possible.

Many of the concerns that Senators raised around the restructuring are to ensure it does not impact on community and local work on the ground. Their headquarters is moving. That is happening in my own county of Meath. We will have the headquarters in County Westmeath. The clear intention of this restructuring is to meet a number of objectives. The local police on the ground will have more autonomy to make decisions where those decisions are specific to the area and localised. That is obviously what so many of us want, that it is more specialised. Already we have the divisional protective service units that have been rolled out in all of the divisions. That is clearly saying that we now have people who are trained and working solely on the area of domestic, sexual and gender-based violence. It is important that we have it not just for that important issue but also in the areas of cybercrime and other areas that will probably move to more specialised units. It is also about getting people out from behind the desk and out on the ground. When we have so many districts we need a background team. To put it that way creates less work that needs to be done behind the scenes, freeing up more people to be out on the ground, which is obviously what we all want.

Many of the Senators touched on Garda numbers in general and the need to ensure that those numbers increase. Two weeks ago, 120 new gardaí came out of Templemore. With restrictions being lifted I am confident that the 800 that are resourced and committed to for this year will go through the process as well. I have spoken with the Garda Commissioner to make sure that we revitalise our Garda Reserve and increase those numbers as well. There are many things happening.

This is just one piece of legislation in a whole suite of measures. Senator Craughwell mentioned the Community Policing, Security and Community Safety Bill, which is quite a large Bill and is a priority in my Department. We are working on it at the moment and hope to have it published in this session. That in itself will implement a number of other changes.

Senator Wall touched on community safety and the JPCs. A core element of the other Bill is around the development of community safety partnerships that would replace the JPCs. The intention is not to take anything away from local councillors or the excellent work that is being done on the ground. It will bring together the local council, councillors, An Garda Síochána and entities such as Tusla, education, community groups and anybody involved in the community, where they can then come together and devise their own community safety plan for that area.

To touch on the last point made by Senator Seery Kearney on the funding and access to funding, a new fund has been established which will enable all communities through the community safety partnerships to apply for money that will essentially go to projects that they deem suitable for helping their areas, to keep young people safe and devise new programmes or projects, whatever it is they want to do. It is about making sure this is about police on the ground working in communities, working locally. This model will help to achieve that.

Of course, on this last point, any piece of legislation has an actual built-in mechanism to be reviewed after 12 months. With the changes that are taking place we will all be working closely with the Garda Commissioner and where things are not working or where things need to change, that of course will be taken on board.