Vital youth projects ‘jeopardised’ as Garda vetting backlog hits 60,000

A BACKLOG of 60,000 Garda vetting applications for people working with children is keeping them out of work for longer and stalling youth projects across the country, it has been claimed.

While the Department of Justice says the average processing time for vetting applications is in the region of 10 to 12 weeks, Youth Work Ireland (YWI) claims applications can take up to eight months to process.

Michael McLoughlin of YWI said short-term projects which need volunteers are being put in jeopardy because people cannot get vetted in time.