Sir, – Minister for Justice Frances Fitzgerald is going before the Cabinet to seek the extra resources needed to implement so-called saturation policing in Dublin’s north inner city, an area that has been blighted with much murderous gang-related feuding of late.
Might it be prudent that before fiscal approval is granted for this expensive policing project that due consideration be given to the type of tactics yet to be proposed by An Garda Síochána? Under political and civic pressure, there is a real danger of the beleaguered executive of An Garda Síochána offering us highly reactive operations that are both stale and not wholly specified.
For example, it will be interesting to see if the well-rehearsed norm of high-visibility patrols and designated checkpoints is presented as a panacea for Dublin’s gangland troubles. Should this be the case, it is predictable that such customary crackdown tactics will be seen to be effective initially, they will nevertheless have a short residual deterrent effect, and then when An Garda Síochána’s overtime budget runs out, we will witness an eventual return to pre-intervention levels of crime and disorder on our streets.
Such tactics are analogous to taking aspirin continuously to cure headaches; it gives temporary relief, decreases in effectiveness over time and ultimately masks the causes of the troubles that are triggering the pain in the first place.
Might greater successes and better resource efficiencies be achieved if An Garda Síochána were to produce fresh, community-informed, evidence-based strategies focusing on specific legislative offences, which targeted known suspect offenders and precise gangland hangouts, sooner than contriving impression-creating high-visibility campaigns which do little more than pander to the clamour for an increased Garda presence in Dublin city? – Is mise,
SÉAN Ó CORCRÁIN,
Kilcock, Co Meath.
Sir, – Fintan O'Toole describes a culture of abuse of power and unaccountability within An Garda Síochána; the evidence in at least a number of cases would seem to bear this out ("Garda corrupted by sloppiness, indiscipline and vindictiveness", Opinion & Analysis, May 31st).
Two contributory factors to this should be mentioned. First, some reporters are so dependent on gardaí for information that they in effect are little more than Garda spokesmen; the idea that they might take any critical perspective on any aspect of how the gardaí function would be, in their eyes, tantamount to condoning criminality. Second, the question arises as to whether relatives of serving gardaí have a far higher than average chance of being appointed to the force, thus perpetuating existing culture over the generations and into the foreseeable future. Meanwhile, every discussion of the feud in north inner-city Dublin is used as an opportunity to call for better pay and conditions for serving members, rather than dealing with the matter in hand. – Yours, etc,
EOIN DILLON,
Dublin 8.