Richard O'Donoghue (Limerick County, Independent)
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636. To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Justice and Equality the number of bench warrants outstanding by county as of 31 December 2020; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [6981/21]

Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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The Deputy will be aware that the Garda Commissioner is, by law, responsible for the administration and business of An Garda Síochána, including the allocation of Garda resources in respect of identified operational demands. As Minister, I have no direct role in these decisions.

As the Deputy will appreciate, difficulties in relation to the execution of warrants, including bench warrants, are a long-standing issue for many police services around the world; notably relating to persons actively seeking to evade detection and where limited identification information might be available to support enforcement. I am assured, however, that An Garda Síochána execute warrants as expeditiously as possible, giving priority to the execution of warrants relating to serious crimes.

The following table, furnished to me by the Garda authorities, shows the number of outstanding bench warrants as of 31 December 2020 for each Garda Division.

I am informed that these figures were collated based on PULSE data as of 4 February 2021. As they constitute real time operational data, they are liable to change.