Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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470. To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Justice and Equality when his Department was first made aware of the 999 Garda call scandal. [49918/25]

Jim O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay South, Fianna Fail)
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An Garda Síochána wrote to the Secretary General of my Department on 4 December 2020 to inform the Department that a number of 999 calls had been cancelled on the Garda Computer Aided Dispatch System and that An Garda Síochána was carrying out a review of the reasons behind this.

Following initial engagement by the Department with the Garda authorities, Minister Helen McEntee wrote to the Policing Authority on 5 February 2021 to ask the Authority to oversee the Garda review into this matter.

The Authority commissioned an external expert, Derek Penman, to conduct an examination of the adequacy of the review being undertaken by An Garda Síochána of the invalid and unwarranted closure of Computer Aided Dispatch incidents.

The Policing Authority published an interim update by the independent expert in November 2021 that outlined key findings and recommendations, which were accepted by the Commissioner.

The second phase of Mr Penman's examination involved listening to a structured sample of calls in order to assess the quality of the response provided to callers. The final report was published on 29 September 2022.