Harris will not seek budget hike until spend reviewed
New Garda chief Drew Harris said he will not pursue more money from the Government until he first examines how the force is spending its current “very big” budget.
Referring to yesterday’s report that the Garda budget was €30m in the red, with €25m due to overtime and training, the new boss said he would be looking at bringing that overspend “back in line”.
The comments put him at odds with the Garda Representative Association, which called on the Government to “plug this shortfall”, and said excessive garda overtime reflected inadequate frontline policing resources.
In his first press conference, the former PSNI deputy chief constable also said:
- His primary concern in relation to Brexit was “police to police co-operation” with the PSNI, given that UK’s involvement in EU criminal justice treaties would end;
- He does not have any outstanding intelligence from his PSNI days on murders here that he has not already given An Garda Síochána, saying that he was involved in exchanging “very sensitive intelligence” with gardaí that “prevented many terrorist outrages”;
- He stood over his evidence at the Smithwick Tribunal in 2012 that unnamed garda/gardaí colluded with the murder by the IRA of two senior RUC officers in 1989;
- He was an Irishman and was not an outsider;
- Dissident republicans remained the “greatest threat” on the island of Ireland;
- If he needed to, he would ‘speak truth to power’ if the Government was not providing enough resources.
Mr Harris said the force was “well resourced” and the “first thing” he was going to do was examine if that money was used effectively and efficiently.
“Before I ask for more, I want to understand exactly how we are using the resources we have.”
