Expert: Garda reform is now or never

An Garda Síochána is in crisis and must urgently change now or risk failing to ever reform, the head of the commission into the future of policing has warned.

Commission chair and former garda inspectorate chief Kathleen O’Toole issued the dire warning as pressure continued to mount on crisis-hit Garda Commissioner Nóirín O’Sullivan over the garda college financial scandal.

Speaking at the MacGill Summer School in the Glenties, Co Donegal, in the aftermath of Tuesday’s damning Dáil Public Accounts Committee report into the garda college, and as at least five more investigations continue into the controversy, Ms O’Toole insisted reform cannot be delayed.