One in three Garda reserve hopefuls fail

MORE than one third of applicants to the Garda reserve force are failing entrance exams or interviews, new figures reveal.

Despite Justice Minister Michael McDowell driving through plans to beef up police numbers with some of the 7,100 civilians who have so far signed up, many are failing at the first hurdle.

The first interviews were held in September involving 374 of the reserve candidates. Of these, 138 people failed to pass either the interview or the written tests, department figures show.

A breakdown of the 6,661 applicants also shows up regional differences.

As expected, applicant numbers were high for counties surrounding Dublin, with 332 in Kildare, 226 in Louth, 328 in Meath and 154 in Wicklow.

But a surprisingly high number have come forward in Donegal (185), where the issue of garda corruption has dogged the county’s police force in recent years.

The number of applicants was also high in Mayo (217) in comparison to counties with much larger populations, such as Limerick (239).

The details from the Department of Justice show that up until September 20, 6,661 people wanted to be in the reserve.

Since then and up to October 27, another 439 applications were received bringing the number up to 7,100 exactly. The most recent applicants, as not processed yet, were not included in the county by county breakdown.

Some 37 of the candidates applying came from the North. In addition to potential reservists signing up from the 26 counties and the north, another four applicants were Irish living abroad, the department confirmed.

Training has begun for the first round of candidates who did manage to pass tests and interviews. By yesterday, 37 had reached the second round of training. Applicants from Limerick, Kerry, Galway, Clare, Sligo as well as Dublin will be the next to be interviewed and sit exams. Michael McDowell wants up to 900 in the first recruiting tranche for the garda reserve. A small number of candidates who have passed into training stages are understood now to be learning operational roles in Templemore College alongside the force, which include courses on arrests and self defence.

An informed security source yesterday said candidates had been failing interviews and exams because of “poor academic abilities”.

“They had inadequate abilities in written and oral tests,” added the source.