Gangland crime a priority, says Ahern

Official opening: Minister unveils new Garda divisional headquarters:MINISTER FOR Justice Dermot Ahern has insisted that tightening budgets will not erode commitment or impede efforts to reduce gangland crime.

Rejecting claims that the economic crisis would affect An Garda Síochána’s work, Mr Ahern said Operation Anvil, established in 2005 to tackle Dublin’s gun crime, had recently been allocated an extra €1 million, while the Criminal Assets Bureau’s budget had increased by 15 per cent.

“In my view, that’s a very massive commitment,” he said.

Some 400 new recruits would join the Garda this year, the Minister said, although he conceded that the target of 16,000 gardaí by 2012 may not be met.

“It’s possible that over the lifetime of the Government, we may not be able to reach the 16,000. My job, given the reduced resources is to keep that level of gardaí up as much as possible,” siad Mr Ahern.

“Im criticised, I know, in other areas of the department as to why I’m reducing here, there and everywhere. The fact is, I believe the Irish people want me and the Government to respond to the issue of crime and keep it as the number one priority.”

The Minister was speaking yesterday at the official opening of a new Garda divisional headquarters in Ballymun, Dublin.

Launching a new community policing model at the same event, Garda Commissioner Fachtna Murphy said developing close relationships with communities was essential to the work of the force, “as they are our greatest ally in our work in preventing and detecting crime and protecting the safety of the people we serve”.

“We need to be in there with the communities, working in collaboration and partnership with the communities, and getting the information, getting the intelligence, because that’s what leads to the captures, to the firm side of policing.”

Deputy Commissioner Nacie Rice has been nominated to act as community policing “champion” in an attempt to ensure that the culture and ethos of community policing is firmly embedded in its organisation’s policies, Mr Murphy siad.