Tom Brabazon (Dublin Bay North, Fianna Fail)
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181. To ask the Tánaiste and Minister for Justice and Equality the total number of 999 calls made and the number of callouts arising from these calls for each year from 2020 to 2024 and to date in 2025. [68250/25]

Jim O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay South, Fianna Fail)
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Under the Communications Regulation (Amendment) Act 2007, responsibility for the 999 or Emergency Call Answering Service (ECAS) contract now falls under the Department of Culture, Communications and Sport, and my colleague Minister Patrick O'Donovan. As such, I am unable to provide figures for all 999 calls made as these cover all emergency services.

In respect of calls for An Garda Síochána, Garda authorities have provided the below table which outlines the number of emergency calls received at each Regional Control Centre (RCC). I'm informed that the figures below do not capture calls for service which are not considered to be emergency in nature.

An Garda Síochána operates a Regional Control Room strategy which ensures that Garda resources are available to respond to calls for service from the public, including situations where a local resource is not immediately available.

Calls for service, whether received through a local Garda station or the 999 ECAS system, are routed through the Regional Control Rooms and prioritised for response. Higher priority calls will always take priority over lower priority calls.

The Garda authorities inform me that An Garda Síochána aim is to answer 80% of 999 calls within 7 seconds and deploy resources immediately giving an estimated time of arrival.

I am advised by Garda authorities that GardaSAFE, the new computer-aided dispatch system in use by An Garda Síochána, was rolled out incrementally across the country during 2023.

While GardaSAFE does provide live operational data, such as call volumes, to Regional Control Rooms, detailed reporting functionality is still under development.

The available data is currently being assessed for quality and consistency, with a view to enabling bespoke queries and detailed analysis in due course. It is expected that these capabilities will be in place in the near future.

The Garda Commissioner is by law responsible for all operational policing matters, including response by An Garda Síochána to emergency calls.