Jury’s out on garda call centre plan says JPC chair
The plan to send calls to local garda stations to Galway is raising concern
Among the issues that will be on the agenda when Garda Commissioner Drew Harris visits the county later this month will be garda numbers, policing the border area, lack of adequate resources, the armed response unit and the garda call centre plan.
The Commissioner is coming to the county on the invitation of the Joint Policing Committee (JPC). The Chairperson of the JPC Gerry McMonagle says he is concerned about the plans to have calls to local garda stations directed to a centralised system in Galway.
Cllr Mc Monagle says the system may present a number of difficulties for the region among which he said would be local knowledge of local areas, availability of resources and the erosion of the connectivity people share on a call with local gardaí.
Describing the initiative as a pilot scheme, Cllr Mc Monagle said there was no launch or announcement in relation to the scheme which he said was introduced before in Britain and failed.
He said the model may work well in a city but foresees difficulties in rural Donegal: “Donegal is one of the areas selected for the pilot scheme … you couldn’t have picked a worse place. This might be alright when you are sitting in the heart of Dublin with a map of Dublin in front of you … you can react quite quickly but it isn’t the same in Donegal.
“It is urban-centric - it is based on a failed model in Britain. It does not take in the geographic spread of rural Ireland, that is my opinion of it.”
Mr McMonagle said that people will not feel duty bound to tell a call centre in Galway about a suspicious van in the area or other such activity whereas they would mention it to their local garda: “I am concerned about it. The jury is out on this one.”
The resourcing of garda stations, across the county, will also be up for discussion: “For example, you have Lifford where there used to be thirty-two gardaí there on a twenty-four hour basis, eight guards and one sergeant to every shift, and now you have it open two hours a day if you are lucky.”
Mr McGonagle is also eager to hear where the armed response unit will be based.
“We will get an opportunity on the sixteenth to ask a few more questions,” he said.