Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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Community safety is not just about the number of Gardaí in communities. Community safety is a whole of Government responsibility and it requires a multi-agency approach.

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 its own local community safety plan, setting out the key actions to address safety concerns in their respective communities 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. I was pleased to launch the Waterford Community Safety Plan 2023-2028 in March.

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.

The mid-term evaluation was received by my Department in April 2023 and I hope for it to be published in the coming weeks.

A final evaluation report of the LCSP pilot is expected by the end of 2023, ahead of their nationwide rollout as part of the implementation of the Policing, Security and Community Safety Bill.