Garda watchdog in warning on supervision

A policing watchdog has issued an urgent alert over the lack of supervision, by sergeants, of rank-and-file gardaí.

The Garda Inspectorate said sergeants were prevented from going out on patrol with gardaí because of “cumbersome administrative duties” which led to an unacceptable situation.

The body said there were significant gaps in supervision and, in many areas, young and less experienced gardaí are not operating with adequate supervision.

Sergeants-in-charge of regular patrol units told the inspectorate they go out with their units in the field about 10% of the time.

In a detailed report, entitled Frontline Policing, the inspectorate called for a raft of changes to reduce the bureaucratic and court-related responsibilities of sergeants.

The document was submitted to Justice Minister Alan Shatter almost a year ago but only published yesterday.

The report said Garda figures indicated there was an overall ratio of five or six gardaí to every sergeant — which, it was noted, was acceptable compared to most police forces.

But, in reality, it said the ratio for visible frontline policing was an average of nine gardaí for every sergeant and that this ratio was often exceeded.

Examples include:

* One rural town had no sergeant for the normal regular units for over six months;

* In one large urban station there was one section sergeant for four regular units (24 members);

* In one large urban station the ratio of gardaí to a sergeant in four community policing units was 12:1;

* Detective units in two smaller urban stations had ratios of 13:1 and 10:1 respectively.

The report said there were not enough sergeants rostered to work in the evening and night shifts.

The study said there was “inadequate” supervision by sergeants of people in custody in Garda stations.

The inspectorate said the preparation of investigation files and the prosecution of cases in the courts, particularly outside Dublin, was placing a considerable burden on sergeants.

The inspectorate said parades and briefings do not occur at the start of every tour of duty contrary to statements by Garda management in 2009 that this was the case.

An implementation plan, prepared by the Garda Commissioner and published yesterday, indicated the force had agreed to implement most of the report’s 11 recommendations.

Mr Shatter said he was in discussions with Public Expenditure Minister Brendan Howlin about lifting the recruitment embargo in order to allow the appointment of more sergeants and inspectors.

* www.gsinsp.ie