Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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A key element of our policy on building safer and stronger communities is that communities themselves have a crucial role to play. There is no one size fits all approach, because each community has different needs and challenges.

My Department's community safety policy is about people being safe and feeling safe in their own community. This approach goes far beyond the traditional policing response and requires all relevant state bodies and voluntary organisations to work together in a joined-up way, in partnership with the local community, to prioritise and address issues in their own area.

The Policing, Security and Community Safety Bill will place statutory obligations on Departments and other public service bodies to cooperate with each other to improve community safety. It also establishes national structures to provide strategic direction and ensure that collaboration is working, and establishes Local Community Safety Partnerships (LCSPs), which will replace existing Joint Policing Committees.

There are currently three pilot LCSPs in Dublin’s North Inner City, Waterford, and Longford. The partnerships are made up of:

• Community representatives, including residents, youth representatives, members of new and minority communities, local activists, local businesses, and representatives of schools;
• Public sector representatives, i.e., local statutory services such as the HSE, Tusla, An Garda Síochána, and the local authority; and
• Local councillors.

Each partnership will create their own local community safety plan, setting out the key actions to address safety concerns in their community and assigning ownership for these actions. The first such plan has been produced by the Longford LCSP pilot and is available on the Longford County Council website.

Last month, I launched the Waterford Community Safety Plan 2023-2028, which will ensure that communities across Waterford city and county can thrive and flourish, through collaborative actions to prevent and deter crime and harmful behaviours.

The pilot LCSPs are undergoing an ongoing independent evaluation to ensure that, when established nationally, the LCSPs will be designed and supported to help communities prioritise issues raised by its members as safety concerns. A mid-term evaluation, covering the first 12 months of the pilots, is due to be published by my Department shortly.

The intention is that the Policing, Security and Community Safety Bill will become law later this year and be fully commenced in January 2024, with the national roll-out of the community safety partnerships to follow early in 2024.