Sir, – The issue of reduced Garda resources has become a major concern across the country. Ninety-five Garda stations are being closed over the next few weeks while the troika is insisting that we reduce the number of gardaí by 1,000, from 14,500 to 13,500.
At the same time the Lisbon treaty “mandates member states to increase their military capabilities with a view to increasing the capabilities available for the EU’s Common Security and Defence Policy” (National Forum on Europe Summary Guide to the Treaty of Lisbon, Page 8). In line with this obligation Minister of State Fergus O’Dowd told the Dáil last year that the Army was recruiting 600 new cadets!
One has to wonder where our Government’s priority lies – with the needs of its citizens or the needs of the EU’s defence policy? – Yours, etc,
Sir, – Fr Michael Cusack’s comments at the funeral of Det Garda Donohoe’s are a stark reminder of the anger that exists in relation to crime and how it affects the vulnerable in our society who feel isolated; and, more importantly, how thugs are getting away with so-called “petty crime”.
I write as a resident of an estate that has had more than 12 robberies in 12 weeks. When I contacted my local politicians I was told they would forward my concerns (as a concerned citizen who reported a robbery) to the local community garda. Yet when I rang the local garda station I was not even asked for my number, nor did anyone contact me since.
Local community gardaí are under severe pressure due to ridiculous cutbacks and all of us are suffering. Enough is enough. – Yours, etc,
Sir, – With the recent closure of 95 Garda stations across the country, we witness yet another nail in the old imperial infrastructure as part of the biggest restructuring of An Garda Síochána in its 90-year history.
Fianna Fáil’s motion calling for the stations to be kept open is little more than a cry for the “halcyon days” of the empire and unaffordable sentimentalism; commendable as it might be. Niall Collins TD further embellished this notion with his dizzy outburst that closing the stations was “nothing short of cowardly”. He should know. In ratio to taxpayers, his wage and allowances as a TD is nothing short of madness. In a recent article by Keith Duggan (Weekend Review, January 26th), we were informed that Tynagh garda station in Co Galway, as late as 1969, had three sergeants and 14 gardaí.
There was similar rhetoric when provincial Army barracks were being closed down.
The price of independence had always to involve dismantling of the old imperial infrastructures. The only reason we had all the Army barracks in the first instance was to station soldiers (Irish and British) policing an empire and to move regiments around – if only for a periodic change of scenery. The original RIC stations, many of which subsequently become Garda stations, were part of this infrastructure. The irony is that current changes are being forced on us by European institutions on foot of irresponsible borrowing and spending.
In a few hundred years’ time, historians may write about the 100 years following alleged independence in 1922 as a period when this island race with few resources came to terms with dismantling its part and role in an empire at the pace of a sentimental snail. – Yours, etc,