Ahern: Freeze will not hit graduations until end of 2010

DESPITE the embargo on garda recruitment, significant numbers of new recruits will still be graduating from Templemore college until the end of next year, Minister for Justice Dermot Ahern said yesterday.

Mr Ahern said: “There will be continuing relatively large [graduations], indeed right up until probably to the end of next year. We had a programme of taking in 100 every quarter and obviously that is now curtailed as of the middle of this year. But again, this (college) is a resource to be used for training and retraining of the gardaí and we won’t have a ban on recruitment forever.

“Obviously, next year we will be looking at it again in the light of making sure we keep the numbers up as high as possible, given the fact that this government and our predecessors raised numbers to a record high.”