Just 2,000 gardaí on duty at any one time

JUST over 2,000 gardaí are on duty in the country at any one time, from the full complement of 11,900 members of the force, Garda Commissioner Pat Byrne said yesterday.

Dismissing reports 4,000 gardaí were sitting behind desks across the country, leaving only 19 gardaí on duty in each county, the commissioner said he undertook a study of deployment on a typical day.

The study was to establish where everybody was based during a 24-hour period between 10pm on Monday, April 28, and 10pm on Tuesday, April 29 in each garda division. The figures showed there were 4,521 operational uniformed gardaí, 1,171 on operational detective duty and 449 on plain-clothes duty. Spread across three shifts, this put 2,047 gardaí on duty at any given time.