COMMENT

There’s a village in a semi-rural part of Dublin that lost its Garda station this year. Truth be told, it was only open part-time anyway and wasn’t the most effective tool in the fight against local crime.

But it was a permanent Garda presence in the village nonetheless. Since its closure, there has been anecdotal talk of a crime surge in the area. Social networking sites are awash with tales of increased burglaries in the community.

Strangers are reported to be checking out houses by calling door-to-door offering spurious services. Even kids looking for sponsorship are being viewed with extra suspicion.

The bottom line is that people are frightened. Without their local Garda station they feel vulnerable and abandoned. Despite assurances from the Government that the closure of stations would result in more gardai on the beat, there is no obvious evidence of this.

A number of Garda stations throughout Dublin have either been closed or have had their opening hours restricted. Some communities organised protests in advance of the closures, without success.

Business owners and householders were united in their opposition to the move. The Government ploughed ahead regardless.

Without wishing to trivialise the issue of road safety and in particular the use of mobile phones while driving, isn’t it strange that the Minister for Justice seemed to end up in more trouble over the Mick Wallace saga than he did over the closure of Garda stations?

Most commentators would agree that Alan Shatter made an error of judgement when he revealed details of the Garda discretion afforded to Wallace when he was observed using his mobile phone behind the wheel. And despite the furore over Shatter’s actions and the issues it raised about privacy and data protection, it’s hard to feel sympathy for a tax cheat like Wallace.

The reality is that most victims of crime – be it a burglary, a sexual assault or a violent attack – don’t give a damn about data protection or Mick Wallace or Alan Shatter. They just want to feel safe in their own homes and on our streets.

The Wallace/Shatter debacle was a waste of Dail time and a pointless sideshow; another smokescreen to divert us from the real issues of the day – issues such as the closure of our Garda stations.