A RANDOM sampling by The Irish Times of middle and upper ranking gardai found agreement that zero tolerance, as they understand it, is not appropriate to this State.

The officers considered zero tolerance to mean rigid enforcement of every law, and argued not only that it would fail, but that it would be damaging to the relationship between the Garda and the public.

"It is very important that we have discretion for minor offences, otherwise we'd lose public support," said one. "We depend a lot on the public when we're investigating serious crimes, and we wouldn't get that."

"People would hate us," said another.

One suggested that if zero tolerance were to be introduced up to 2,000 gardai, a fifth of the force would resign or would have to be fired, because they would refuse to implement the policy. "They just wouldn't be able to live with handling people that way. It wouldn't be worth the hassle. They wouldn't enjoy their jobs, and the country wouldn't be a very nice place to live in."

"Policing is a balance," said another. "If a new sergeant goes into an area and he's too tough, you'll get trouble. But if he's too lenient, you get no respect and there'll be trouble as well. It's very difficult, but policing is about finding a balance between those two things."

"Our force is down 700 people since 1987," he added, "yet the Government has employed 20,000 more public servants since then. So who's serious about law and order?"

Most expressed the fear that zero tolerance would mean "clogging up the courts" with minor offences, diverting resources from more serious crimes. There was little support for the idea that concentrating on minor crime led to a reduction in more serious offences.

Their strongest impression was that zero tolerance would do untold damage to the relationship between the Garda and the community.

There is a natural resistance to change in most large organisations, particularly those which value tradition. Suggesting change is often tantamount to criticising what has gone before. People in large organisations also tend to fear that a new policy means more work.

In a recent radio interview the Garda Commissioner was asked why young people now appeared more unruly. He said: "Society has changed", arguing that people have less respect for authority. The Assistant Commissioner for Dublin, Mr Tom King, emphasised the responsibilities of parents after disturbances in Tallaght.

Since the 1960s, according to one British academic, "police officers had inevitably been influenced by the idea that the real causes of crime were economic, and crime could only be tackled by attacking the root causes.

This is also true of the gardai, who have become more articulate in explaining the influence on their work of social and economic deprivation, and high unemployment.

POLITICAL calls for zero tolerance policing rest on the unstated view that the police should not be allowed to promote the `deprivation' argument as an excuse for a growth in crime. It is only natural that politicians would wish to divert attention from their own failure to tackle the imbalance in the economy which ensures that the "boom" is not evenly spread.

The Garda can point to a 2 per cent reduction in indictable (or serious) crimes last year, to about 100,000, with the trend continuing through the first three months of this year. The "detection rate" in 1995 (the most recent official figure) of 37 per cent compared well with forces elsewhere.

The Garda has been more successful in murder investigations and breaking up big drug gangs recently, but to the public the crimes that affect them most directly are what matter. In the end, the arguments about zero tolerance probably come down to public perception.

People tend to discuss a small range of crimes, burglaries, muggings, thefts from a car, and base their view of the Garda on how the force performs according to how their experience accords with that of their friends and relatives.

The Garda may be making less of an impression in these areas than it realises. The 1995 report shows that for a range of these crimes the "detection rate" is significantly lower, at 30 per cent. When it comes to larceny from cars, the rate is 26 per cent, a success rate of less than three quarters the overall rate.

A garda at a station desk may already be concerned with a rape, or a syringe attack, or a serious assault, when an unhappy motorists calls in to report a stolen car radio. The garda may unconsciously show where the radio lies on his list of priorities.

It may be that what the Garda needs is specific operations targeting such crimes, not just to improve the overall detection rates, but to prove the force is as concerned about these crimes as the public.

There is no evidence that muggings and thefts from cars are routinely ignored, but there is a feeling that for some matters the garda in the station simply shrugs his shoulders.

The Garda Commissioner probably made the right intervention in the debate when he expressed doubts about zero tolerance. It wouldn't work. It couldn't work.

But he must also address the bigger picture: why does it seem that Fianna Fail appears to be winning the public debate? Is it simply that everyone likes the notion of a crime free utopia, and the public feels zero tolerance is a way towards that? Or is it that in some areas, in dealing with the crimes most people experience directly, the Garda needs to find a way to boost public confidence in the force?