Garda overtime to double at Christmas

Garda overtime is to be doubled during the Christmas period, Justice Minister Michael McDowell announced today.

Gardaí will mount high visibility operations to prevent burglaries, public order offences and road deaths.

Mr McDowell said the €4m allocation would fund 140,000 hours in additional Garda overtime.

“I have no doubt that this will be of great benefit to Garda Commissioner Noel Conroy in ensuring a high visibility presence of gardaí in our communities between now and the end of the year,” he said.

He added that the overtime allocation had been doubled since last year. It will be used in a series of Garda operations including:

Patrols by plain clothed and uniformed gardaí outside nightclubs and areas with public order problems;

Patrols outside the car parks of nightclubs and pubs;

Burglary prevention patrols in residential housing estates;

Increased gardaí presence on the roads.

However Labour Justice spokesman Joe Costello TD said the reliance on overtime due to Minister McDowell’s failure to expand the force.

“He has had all the time in the world to recruit the extra gardaí to obviate the need for overtime but he hasn’t done so.”

He added that the Minister was contradicting his promise to reduce overtime among gardaí and prison officers.

“He’s in breach of his own policy. He obviously doesn’t have enough gardaí to cover the ground so he is going to embark on a splurge of overtime,” he said.