Emer Higgins (Dublin Mid West, Fine Gael)
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534. To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Justice and Equality if he will provide a breakdown of the number of prosecutions for assault against taxi drivers while on duty for each of the years 2018 to 2023. [26132/23]

Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)
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As the Deputy is aware, the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) is fully independent in her functions under Section 2 (5) of the Prosecution of Offences Act 1974 (as amended). As the Office of the DPP is not an agency under my remit as Minister for Justice I have no role in the operations, functions, oversight or governance of that Office. Therefore, I am unable to provide any general or statistical information related to the work of the Director. This includes all breakdowns of prosecutions.

To be of assistance, I contacted the Garda authorities in relation to the number of charges/summons related to the information sought by the Deputy. It should be noted in general however that the number of charges/summons does not equal or equate to the number of prosecutions as there are a number of reasons why a charge/summons may not proceed to Court.

I have however been advised by the Garda authorities that the occupation of a victim of any crime is not recorded in a structured manner on PULSE and neither is there a crime incident type specific to taxi drivers. As a result the information requested by the Deputy related to 'assault against taxi drivers while on duty' does not exist and I am unable to provide any statistics related to same.