Having met rank-and-file Garda members last week at their annual conference, Garda Commissioner Drew Harris was left in no doubt about the strength of feeling about controversial new rosters for the force. Addressing members of the Garda Representative Association (GRA), Harris said he had already made compromises in a bid to reach agreement on rostering arrangements. But he insisted that he can’t be the only one who makes compromises.
It was a clear reference to the need, in his view, for the GRA and the Association of Garda Sergeants and Inspectors (Agsi) to also show flexibility. Delegates heckled and jeered him, some with shouts of “come on”, illustrating the level of annoyance about the mooted new rosters.
The dispute pre-dates the Covid-19 pandemic. When the pandemic struck, most gardaí moved on to new 12-hour rosters, working in a four days on, four days off, rotation. Those new working hours were intended to meet the challenges of the pandemic.
Those rosters have proven very popular – with fewer days worked per year and more allowances for working unsocial hours.
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Harris believes new rostering arrangements are required to better meet police demands. He wants to shorten many shifts and spread the distribution of personnel on duty to match those times when the policing service is under most pressure.
But the GRA and Agsi say that under Harris’s plans some Garda members will work up to 47 extra days per year and will lose an average of ¤2,000 on unsocial hours allowances foregone.
At the GRA conference, gardaí complained of poor morale, bullying by senior officers and shortcomings in training and equipment at a time when attacks on gardaí were increasing. They have long complained about the level of administration they are required to undertake
The difficulty now for Harris is that all of those complaints and concerns have been conflated. The general anger, the feeling of being put-upon, across the force is now all being channelled into the rosters dispute.
Just last month Harris extended the Covid “contingency” rosters for six months – the fifteenth time they have been extended. That allows for six months of further talks with the GRA and Agsi. Harris must now find a solution, and one that does not involve an increase in Garda remuneration, or a once-off payment. That would prove costly to the exchequer and risk contagion across the public service.
Harris was recruited in 2018 as the commissioner to reform the Garda. He must now find a way to implement modern rosters that meet changing policing demands while preventing industrial unrest in a dispute where a “Blue flu” style action has already been mooted.