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SPECIAL GARDA OPERATIONS targeting gangs and violent criminals in some parts of the capital have had their overtime stopped in a bid to save money for the papal visit later this summer, TheJournal.ie has learned.
In the last 48 hours, Garda units based in west Dublin have been told that local crime operations cannot be done while on overtime. Gardaí must now carry out these activities as part of their normal tours of duty.
These activities include surveillance operations targeting criminals, as well as community outreach programmes designed to reduce anti-social behaviour in certain areas.
Many of these operations take place during overtime hours as it is often the case that gardaí do not have enough time to carry out all of their core duties, as well as other specialised tasks, in their normal working day.
Well-placed sources said that the growing bill for the papal visit is one of the main reasons the overtime budget has been drastically curtailed. So far this year, the garda budget has gone over its estimates by €12 million.
Senior gardaí have been ordered to brief their members about the changes and to reject all requests for overtime until they are informed otherwise.
There is a separate budget for Operation Hybrid – a specialised garda task force targeting the workings of the Kinahan crime gang. These patrols will continue but, according to a circular sent to senior gardaí, “it is essential that this budget is not exceeded in any way”.
There will still be provisions for overtime under Operation Thor which targets burglary gangs operating nationwide.
Sources have explained that certain special operations were the only thing keeping a lid on the activities of violent groups in the west Dublin area.
Prior to their introduction, serious public order incidents were the norm and gardaí were routinely injured in rammings and assaults. It is feared that the same communities will now left exposed to criminal gangs again.
The Phoenix Park is based in the Dublin Metropolitan Region West. It is hoped that any savings made in the garda region in the coming months will offset the high cost of protecting the pope and spectators at the event.
The visit
Pope Francis is expected to arrive into Ireland on August 24. He is scheduled to say Mass at the Phoenix Park a day later. He is attending the World Meeting of Families which is being held in Dublin between 21 and 25 August. The pontiff is also expected to visit Knock in Co Mayo.
Hundreds of uniformed members will be deployed around the Phoenix Park – many to assist public order units ,with others helping stewards to keep the event safe and to avoid any crushes or bottlenecks.
However, there will also be a large number of specialist units around the park on the day. These will include armed gardaí, bomb sniffer dogs as well as snipers. Members of the Emergency Response Unit will also carry out their own security detail for the Pope while he is in Ireland. Members of the Defence Forces will also be carrying out security details.
The Vatican will also bring its own security team.
An Garda Síochána is once again dealing with a serious cash flow problem and units across the country and local garda management have been ordered to cut back on non-essential policing operations in the coming months.
We reported earlier this month that overtime is to be capped across the country.
A new directive released to gardaí stated that overtime is to be strictly restricted to budget in a bid to stem costs.
The first five months of 2018 saw such work run over-budget in the force by nearly €12 million.
“Each district, division, and region must take measures to ensure that no overtime is approved which will exceed the relevant budgetary allocation in that roster,” a memo from the Garda executive states.
Gardaí refused to be drawn on claims the restrictions were being imposed to free up money to police events later in the year.
However, a spokesman said gardaí are satisfied with current resourcing levels.
A statement read: “Local Garda Management closely monitors the allocation of Garda personnel in the context of crime trends, policing needs and other operational strategies in place on a District, Divisional and Regional level, to ensure optimum use is made of Garda resources, and the best possible Garda service is provided to the public.
“Senior Garda Management is satisfied that a comprehensive policing service continues to be delivered and that current structures in place meet the requirement to deliver an effective and efficient policing service to the community. Garda management is provided with an annual budget and must work within that budget. The budget is kept under constant review by local and senior Garda Management. An Garda Síochána will maintain the current level of service provided to our communities.”
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This young farmer/food producer is completely right to suggest that his sector is being made a scapegoat for the sins of the combustion industry.
As combustion induced global heating gathers pace at a frightening speed, maybe Irish farmers should take a leaf out of the oil cartel’s handbook, and cut production in order to increase prices abroad for top quality food.
We need to use our own land to produce our own energy, and finally break free from the stranglehold of fossil fuel addiction.
To simply live, we need to live simply.
@Ciaran Sherry: and if every country takes a similar approach to food production then what happens? Reduced food supply doesn’t just result in higher per unit prices, it also results in mass starvation. How many people should we be looking to sacrifice in our pursuit of this simple life?
@Ciaran Sherry: I suspect that if Irish farmers cut production, farmers elsewhere would just be thankful for being gifted markets.
@Ciaran Sherry: They would be swallowed by the global marketplace. The fact is food production and human consumption are not sustainable. Diets need to be supplemented and the process needs to part move into a lab, yes yes, the jobs the people, I’m not talking about tomorrow but it’s coming and is unavoidable.
@Ciaran Sherry: a lot of people think that things will be the same buy what u want eat what you want farmers followe the policy of government in 2007 this included the greens cheap food high production they all screamed knowing this was not good for biodiversity now the very same people are saying the opposite so farmers will now cut production eu climate policy has no payments planned what so ever for this despite grace suleiman and other greens saying we will be compensated farmers should tell them to go where the sun doesn’t shine
Whoops – hospitals over the last 25 years.
But apparently we’re meant to believe we can change the planet’s climate
The climate doomsters conveniently forget the climate of Earth has changed regularly & mankind has always managed to adapt.
AND we now have technology our ancestors could only have dreamed of.
We should encourage our hard working farmers to create as much food as possible
Simples
@Gerry Kelly: ‘mankind has always managed to adapt’: What price would you be willing to pay for ‘adaptation’? As more and more parts of the world turn to uninhabitable desert, would you be happy to see the population of Ireland increase to, say, 30 million through migration that people are forced to undertake in order to survive?
Oddly, it seems to me that the climate crisis denialists and those most opposed to (inward) migration are always the same people.
@Gerry Kelly: 1) Mankind has already changed the planet’s climate. Hence the mess we have created.
2) Mankind has only existed on this planet for a couple of hundred thousand years. A blink of the eye with regards to the species that have come and gone since life arose here. Through most of that time we have barely hung on. But the last 6 thousand years or so have been a climate sweet spot for humans, allowing us to expand across almost the entire planet, and increase our population to 8 billion.
During the last 200 years or so we have polluted our atmosphere with greenhouse gases that have and will increase global temperatures.
We are now approaching the the upper limit of that climate sweet spot.
@Gerry Kelly: Nope, people who know about anthropogenic climate change also know about natural climate change, it’s only those who are minimally informed who think otherwise. Mankind have not gad to adapt through a mass extinction event yet which is what we’re staring down the barrel at at the moment.
World population 1950 – 2bn
2050 – projected to hit 10 BN
Our island nation has a population of 5 million & we haven’t been able to build enough houses schools or hosp
@Gerry Kelly: World population 2000 years ago was probably in the region of 150 million.
Hence the attack on farmers to devalue land for the landgrab which will “offset” emissions.
Don’t fall for this, guys.
Lovely steak
The issue is that farming lobbyists and representative organisations appear to use exactly the same tactics as the fossil fuel industry: block, deny and try to preserve the status quo.
If farming representative organisations come with proposals to reduce subsidies for fossil fuels and fossil fuel companies, to reinvest these in promoting sustainable farming (i.e. switching from livestock farming to tillage and land regeneration), I reckon there may be quite a few who’d go along with this. The only ones I see coming up with these type of solutions are those that farmers hate: environmentally-minded policy makers.
The planet’s climate is changing
It has in changed in Ireland 7 times since the last Ice Age melted away
Unless I’ve got something wrong – we appear to have survived those changes & my hunch is we’ll survive this one also
@Gerry Kelly: Your hunch outweighs science. You win.
It might very well be true. If it is you were put there, not by the Greens but by Mr. Badman and his cronies in the Department. If farmers free themselves of these malign influences they might find that people appreciate them and the work they do
We have been told that Ireland has high per capita Greenhouse gas emissions.
This article claims that a reason why Ireland’s farming related CO2 emissions are such a high proportion of our total is that we do not have the heavy industry of other countries.
Something is awry.
@ItWasLikeThatWhenIGotHere:
Per various CO2 emissions per Capita lists for 2021/2022:
Ireland averages around 7 t
Palau in Oceania around 178 t
@ItWasLikeThatWhenIGotHere: yes but when you add up our total emissions it is nothing will have no effect on the climate biodiversity here is another question though
@Athena: According to worldinfometers, in 2022 Ireland’s per capita CO2 emissions was 8.29 tonne, with Palau at 2.34 tonne.
But that is not the point I was raising.
We are told our per capita emissions are high, compared to the average, or even the just among our peers.
Yet this article states that we do not have the heavy industry of other countries, that heavy industry to makes up so much of their emissions. The article claims that because the absence of emissions from heavy industry, our emissions from agriculture is relatively high, i.e. appears high only because of this absence.
Something does not add up.
If that claim is correct, then how on Earth are our per capita emissions so high?
Or is that claim misleading?
Why are so many of the articles “comment closed”.
@T M Byrne: in case SF/IRA would bring publisher to court
One third of all food produced worldwide is wasted, and that waste contributes the same GHG emissions per year to the global total as the total emissions of the European Union. Now by my reckoning if that food waste was tackled and eliminated, it would reduce the global GHG emissions by the same amount as I mentioned earlier.
That would be a major step in the right direction and it would effectively reduce global agricultural emissions by one third. Because less waste means less need for production.
Seems unfair to farmers who happily produce other than dairy/livestock, this article doesn’t give them a mention?
… any adults in the room?
Daft to start killing Irish cows which feed 44 million people, to reduce emissions
… while we have NO TAX (World Wide) on jet fuel or tanker fuel ….
… to fly us off on City Breaks and Tourist trails
and ship all those unnecessary goods around the world.
No VAT, No Excise Duty, No National Oil Reserve Levy” … nothing.
…. “Far from Right!”
… any adults in the room?
@Neuville-Kepler62F: technical point – I don’t know about you but my cows are dead when I eat them. Bit hysterical?
Just to make it clear – I am absolutely NOT a climate change denier. It is abundantly clear the p
Who in earth would ever listen to a farmer lol
@Murray peter: Everyone with a bit of intelligence would.
Tell us about your knowledge of farming?
How many days a week do you work?
Farmers work a seven day week, year in year out.
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