New gardaí ‘joining into pay poverty’

New gardaí who’ve just gone onto the streets have “been recruited into poverty” with a basic pay of €23,171 per year and unlike their older colleagues don’t get the annual €4,000 rent allowance.

The GRA, which represents frontline gardaí, say this is totally unacceptable, bearing in mind they face the same dangers as older colleagues and the wages they get are nearly one-seventh of that of a minister.

GRA president Dermot O’Brien said “it’s regrettable” that acting Minister for Justice Frances Fitzgerald won’t be attending the association’s annual conference in Killarney today to hear about the plight of the new recruits. She is involved in government formation talks.

“Some of these gardaí drive for three hours to commute to and from work. Others rely on their parents to help to pay bills. Many of them will have been injured in the line of duty and I can categorically state that all of them are worried about their pay, allowances and pensions,” Mr O’Brien said.

“When I started as a garda over 20 years ago, this was regarded as a worthwhile career, a job that people looked up to. But these new recruits don’t remember when being a garda was considered to be a ‘good’ job, a job where you were respected in communities and respected by management. For Gardaí in 2016, being spat at is a daily occurrence, assaults happen without recourse and management can’t even bring themselves to acknowledge the sacrifices we make nor defend the choices we have to take, often in the heat of the moment.”

The GRA president said that during the recent election , Fine Gael campaigned with the logo ‘Let’s Keep The Recovery Going’.

“The only question our members would ask is ‘what recovery?’ Rank and file gardaí have yet to see this recovery trickling down to us. We have suffered the brunt of the cuts while being now told the emergency is over. Gardaí are the people who want to make their communities better places. As we now enter a supposed economic upturn, it is time to pay back our goodwill. Restore us, rebuild us, reward us,” Mr O’Brien said.

Frontline gardaí have lost nearly a quarter of their wages since the recession and are demanding it back.

Mr O’Brien said that while the GRA can’t strike or engage in industrial action, “it might well become increasingly difficult to our members to restrain their anger in the future.”

He said low morale in the force had “now morphed into anger of unprecedented levels especially among younger members, whose experience of industrial relations is only negative.”