Garda stations in Cork and Cavan set to be reopened

TWO Garda stations are to be reopened in Cork and Cavan as part of a pilot project to reopen six bases.

Acting Garda Commissioner Dónall Ó Cualáin has completed and sent to the Department of Justice a final report regarding the six stations set to be reopened.

An interim report previously controversially recommended the reopening of Stepaside Garda Station in the constituency of Cabinet minister Shane Ross.

Three further stations were also earmarked for reopening.

The Commissioner has now decided that on top of the previous four bases mentioned this summer, the Garda stations at Ballinspittle, Co. Cork, and Bawnboy, Co. Cavan, are to be reopened.

The final report on the reopening of the stations has been delivered to the secretary general of the Department of Justice, Noel Waters, who is due before the Dáil Public Accounts Committee today.

Mr Waters is expected to say: ‘During the depths of the recession, the then Commissioner proposed in his policing plans for 2012 and 2013 the closure of 139 Garda stations.

‘While there were modest cost savings arising from the programme, the core intention was to streamline policing practices and to provide the most efficient policing service possible with the scarce resources available at the time – a time of difficult economic circumstances.

‘Deputies will be aware that the closure of Garda stations, no more than the closure of post offices or hospitals, proved controversial.’

Mr Waters is expected to say the criteria set by the Government for the reopening of stations were ‘eminently sensible’.

He is also expected to say that the process was ‘subject to the normal clearance by the Office of the Attorney General, and the Policing Authority were also consulted and agreed with the approach’.

In addition, the PAC is also expected to receive an update into the situation at the Garda College in Templemore, following an inquiry into alleged irregularities.