Fianna Fáil is pledging to shake up Garda recruitment by offering training in colleges and universities outside of Templemore.

The party will set out their plan to tackle crime today and it will include a pledge to increase Garda numbers through reforms to the recruitment process.

On Newstalk Breakfast, Minister of State at the Department of Justice James Browne said Fianna Fáil wants to recruit an extra 5,000 Gardaí over the lifetime of the next Government.

"How we will do that is not only through Templemore Garda College but expanding the capacity to recruit Gardaí Síochána by relying on other universities and colleges," he said.

Recruitment

Deputy Browne said this would give people "different pathways" into the profession.

"At the moment if you want to become a Guard, you only have one way of doing it - which is to give up what you're doing and go down to Templemore," he said.

"That's very onerous on anyone who's not coming straight out of secondary school, who are quite young and quite mobile.

"We're very restrictive of the talent pool that's there, and the number we can recruit."

Deputy Browne said other parties are proposing building a "second Templemore'', but he dismissed this idea.

"If you look at how long it takes to build things sometimes in this country, I don't know how long that will take," he said.

Garda presence in Dublin City Centre on 19/09/2024 Image: Alan Rowlette / © RollingNews.ie

Deputy Browne said if elected, Fianna Fáil will give recruits more pay while they train.

"I think you need to give them a substantial amount of pay to encourage [more recruits]," he said.

"We see that in other services, for example, if you're recruiting paramedics, they get significant training allowances."

Deputy Browne said the reason Ireland doesn't have more Gardaí is due to a lack of "innovation, imagination and determination" in the system.

He said that today we have "effectively" the same number of Gardaí as we did 13-years ago.

Feature Image by: Mark Condren/RollingNews