Rural Ireland Thinks: Only a third of drivers stopped at Garda checkpoint in the last year

Three-quarters of respondents to the Irish Examiner/Ipsos B&A poll feel overall policing in rural areas has been downgraded

91% of rural adults agree with calls for a dedicated Garda road safety unit, with 66% saying they strongly agree. Picture: Larry Cummins

Barely a third of drivers living in rural areas have been stopped at a Garda checkpoint and only a fifth of those living in those communities say there is a visible Garda presence on their roads.

The Irish Examiner Ipsos/B&A survey of people living in rural Ireland also reveals three-quarters of people feel overall policing in rural areas has been downgraded.

The general secretary of the Garda Representative Association, Ronan Slevin, said the impact of recruitment and retention problems within the gardaí “has disproportionately impacted on rural areas as have structural changes to the way in which policing is being delivered as a result of the operational policing model”.

Mr Slevin said the fewer gardaí who are available "are desk bound in front of screens ticking boxes".

He added the decision to reduce the number of roads policing members "has reduced visibility and removed a fear of being caught or stopped for those committing road traffic offences".

Of the people surveyed, more than three-quarters (77%) said they believed policing in rural Ireland had been downgraded in the past decade.

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While the poll also found just 57% said they had access to a Garda station, 81% said they felt safe in rural Ireland.

Alice Doyle, deputy president of the Irish Farmers Association and co-chairperson of the Rural Safety Forum, said: “I don’t foresee us having an awful lot of new guards out in rural Ireland at the minute because they are not available and the pressure is to put them in cities where the biggest crime is."

A statement from the gardaí said during the first half of this year, it had invested significant time and effort into visible policing and enforcement on Irish roads.

It said more than 4,600 drivers had been arrested for driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs in that period — an average of one driver per hour.

It also said gardaí had carried out more than 50,000 checkpoints in that period — an average of 275 per day.

The statement stressed the organisation had not closed any Garda stations since the Government Garda Station Rationalisation Programmes of 2012 and 2013.

“On the contrary, five Garda stations have re-opened and An Garda Síochána is on the public record as stating there is no intent to close any Garda stations at this time."