Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I suppose when you are Taoiseach rather than leader of the Opposition it is not good enough to just define the problem. You have to tell the people of Ireland the actions you are taking. Let me absolutely agree there is a huge body of work that we need to do in relation to Dublin city centre and I will tell the Deputy eight things we are doing. We are putting bodycams on our gardaí. This is a key tool in public safety and garda safety and we have started that in Dublin. Second, we have legislated to increase the sentence for assault causing harm and to increase sentencing for anyone who attacks a member of An Garda Síochána or another emergency worker. Third, this month we will bring forward more proposals from the Ministers, Deputies Donohoe and McEntee, on more efforts we can put in place to support the gardaí based on what we have heard from gardaí on the front line. Fourth, we are legislating on knife crime. That legislation was before the House yesterday. Fifth, we are providing extra money for more garda overtime. That is not a statistic. It is €28 million to fund more garda hours on the streets of our capital city and across our country. Sixth, we have established a Dublin city task force. We are willing to work with the Deputy and people across the Opposition and across Dublin to see how we can pull everybody together to see what a safe and vibrant Dublin looks like. Seventh, we have put in place Operation Irene, a specific Garda multiagency operation for the summer months to tackle antisocial behaviour. Eighth, in a very practical sense, because we need more gardaí is that we have seen 157 of them come out of Templemore last Friday and we have assigned 102 of them to Dublin. They are real practical measures.

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