Why Garda incompetence is acceptable?

bubblypop wrote: »

Oh, & you are wrong on this also.
Dublin would rank 2nd after London, maybe 3rd after Birmingham , but there are no other cities in England with population over a million.
So, you don't know everything!

He's wrong of course (and being ridiculous) to say it would rank at 30 and the size of a small town in the UK, but you're wrong too.

London, Birmingham, Manchester are the three biggest. Then there is Liverpool, Leeds, and a bit smaller again: Newcastle, Sheffield, Nottingham - all with populations of over a million (when you take in the greater metropolitan area, as you would with Dublin). Dublin would be about the size of the last three. Equivalent to a small to mid sized English city.

Incompetence is embraced with the 'ah sure' attitude and not frowned upon as it should be in Ireland.

We love our tribunals/inquiries where there's the opportunity to make a few bob out of it for many and often result in no implications or meaningful change as a result of the findings.

Goya wrote: »

Tribunals from the perspective of the ordinary person are for seeing justice done - the "we" aren't going to make a few bob out of it.

Most of the tribunals, particularly political, that have taken place in Ireland have seen the square root of **** all justice done.

Naming and shaming - yes. Prison sentences and fines? No.

If justice were done, how come Ahern, Lowry, O'Brien et al did not serve any prison time and/or were pursued by CAB or the revenue?

Maybe the guys on the station were stuck on desk duty because they pissed of the mayor when they totalled a cruiser on a stakeout and the chief had to do something about it.

Did you ask if they put out an APB OP?

Charles Babbage wrote: »

Incompetence is allowed continue because any rigorous attempt to eliminate it would require a thorough examination of how things are done and this would expose failings at the top, where procedures are established and resources allocated. As long as people keep voting for more or less useless politicians and refuse to hold them to account then nothing can change.

There's GSOC, Policing Authority, Inspectorate, Professional Standards and Internal Affairs. The Inspectorate and Policing Authority examine the organisation from top to bottom. The reports of the Inspectorate are pretty illuminating. There is an issue with political interference in the upper echelons but it's hard to see a system that would be better. The policing authority is going to be deciding promotions from now but it's just replacing government appointments with ones by special interest groups.

As regards incompetence, there is a pretty rigorous disciplinary system. It goes from verbal warnings to full on internal hearings with large financial penalties. The problem is that these aren't public so people think they don't happen.

Johnboner wrote: »

I am done, I just cannot stand people making absolutely ridiculous assumptions. Next would be ''But they could have been responding to a mass shooting!'' and to answer your question, no it was not a public order van, it was a small county town not Dublin.

It's not a ridiculous assumption,that's what they get assigned to, even in towns.

Discodog wrote: »

Out of interest what constitutes a free car ? Does the message go out & cars decide if they are free ? If, for example, a car was running a checkpoint would they drop everything to attend ? Do the traffic corps act as ordinary gardai in these situations ?

Surely, if you have a significant crime in progress, every available officer should go, including the superintendent.

When a Garda starts a shift he logs onto the control system. When they are doing something they notify control and they are put as unavailable. When they are finished they clear themselves and become available again. Traffic have their own dispatcher. Some calls will be sent to them, like calls on motorways or road obstructions. Some cars will be assigned to a permanent duty for an entire shift and will be considered unavailable except in emergencies. Only Gardai on the regular shift will be sent to calls. Most checkpoints are done by traffic or members assigned to a specific operation (such as the new Operation Thor).