Funding secured to support safer communities and modernised immigration system.
€2.5 billion for An Garda Síochána – over half a billion euro increase on 2020.
DSGBV funding trebled.
€3.2m to support Youth Justice Strategy including two new Youth Diversion Programmes.
A record €3.61 billion for current expenditure and €310 million for capital investment was allocated in the budget yesterday, for the Justice sector, which will be targeted to enhance public safety, improve crime prevention, ensure safe prisons, and drive end-to-end modernisation across Ireland’s immigration systems.
The major investment of almost €4 billion across the Justice Sector, will equip front-line Gardaí with the necessary tools and resources to strengthen crime prevention and detection; support the rollout of 36 Community Safety Partnerships nationwide; and strengthen efforts under the Zero Tolerance Strategy to combat domestic, sexual, and gender-based violence (DSGBV). In addition, significant funding is allocated for targeted road safety initiatives and to recruit additional prison staff and alleviate the acute pressures of overcrowding within our prisons.
A key focus in this Budget is on the reforming of family law. Over €11m has been allocated to increase staff and improve our Courts Service. An additional €3m will enable the use of expert reports as outlined in the Family Justice Strategy to ensure the voice of each child impacted by family break ups can be heard and to safeguard their needs within the justice system. Through the enactment of the Family Courts Bill, the Minister will move to establish the Family District Court, the Family Circuit Court and the Family High Court, in order to transform our family justice system and make it more user friendly for families.
Budget Highlights
An Garda Síochána.
Garda funding has increased by over €500m (up 27% since 2020), bringing the total budget to €2.48 billion.
This will provide funding to recruit between 800 and 1,000 new Gardaí, along with 150 Garda staff and move towards 1,000 Garda reserves.
Garda overtime has been boosted by 13%, rising to €150 million, to enhance high-visibility policing efforts and serious crime investigation.
The Garda trainee allowance will have almost doubled to €354 per week, effective from 1st October 2024 (up from €184 in 2023).
€1.5 million has been allocated for Garda workforce wellbeing measures, including medical expenses.
€5m to be provided for Public Order Units including two new water cannons, crowd control barriers, expansion of the dog unit and more body armour for frontline Gardaí.
€9 million in additional funding to enhance road safety.
Capital Investments.
€100m of funding for ICT to equip Gardaí with the necessary tools to enhance crime prevention and detection, including Body-Worn cameras and the development of a digital evidence management system which will facilitate the nationwide roll-out of body worn cameras and the introduction of facial recognition technology.
€62m investment in the Garda estate across the country with major projects progressed in 2025 including Portlaoise, Macroom, Clonmel and Newcastlewest.
Fleet upgrades, including new public order vehicles and investment in a range of specialist vehicles to support modern policing.
The delivery of a new helicopter in Q1 2025 for the important work of the Garda Air Support Unit.
Domestic, Sexual, and Gender-Based Violence (DSGBV) & Community Safety.
DSGBV funding is increasing to €70m. This is more than treble the funding for DSGBV services when Minister McEntee first became Minister for Justice, and a further significant increase for 2025.
Increased funding for Cuan to €67m including additional resources to support the implementation of the Zero Tolerance strategy, with funding for 80 additional refuge spaces.
€800k for Cuan will provide for research and data analytics to develop an impact-led approach for evidence and knowledge development to achieve effective DSGBV prevention, protection, prosecution, and policy co-ordination.
A further targeted open call will be launched in 2025 to allow services to come forward with proposals.
€9.5 million allocated for nationwide Community Safety Partnerships and the establishment of a National Office for Community Safety and the Community Safety Innovation Fund.
An expanded Youth Justice Strategy with an increase of total funding by €3.2m and 10.8% bringing the total to €33 million.
Prisons and Probation.
Record funding of €525m has been secured to increase prison capacity and tackle overcrowding. This is an increase of €79m or 18%.
Recruitment of 150 Prison Officers in addition to the 240 Prison Officers recruited in 2024.
An additional €6.2 million to fund 130,000 additional staff hours in our Prisons.
€53m in Capital Funding which will provide for the completion of 155 new prison spaces by the end of 2024 as part of a programme of works.
The Probation Service will receive an additional €4 million bringing the total budget to over €60m to expand crime diversion programmes, support step down facilities, restorative justice, and community-based alternatives to imprisonment.
Immigration Modernisation.
€25m package for end-to-end investment in the immigration system including Service Delivery, International Protection Office, International Protection Appeals Tribunal and the Legal Aid Board. €2m is provided for ICT capital expenditure.
Significant additional resources will be directed to streamline the international protection process, with approximately 400 further staff to be recruited. This will provide for over 25,000 IPO decisions compared to over 14,000 cases in 2024.
Included in the package is €5m in increased investment in digital systems to modernise immigration systems, reduce processing times, increase removals (including with a new charter plane service), and strengthen border security.
Readiness work for the introduction of the EU Asylum and Migration Pact requirements in 2026.
Courts.
€11.1m to Courts Service which will include 50 additional staff to support the expanding Judiciary bringing its budget to over €195m.
This funding will help reduce backlogs and ensure quicker administration of justice.
It includes €2m to support modernisation measures including outsourced jury minding to free up thousands of Garda hours for frontline policing services.
Separately, an additional funding of €3m is to provide a pilot project to support the voice of children in family justice proceedings, including the recruitment of 8 staff as well as other services to assist in these proceedings.
The budget for criminal legal aid will increase in 2025 by over €9m which will include an 8% increase in fees from 1 January 2025. This is in addition to the 10% increase in fees secured in Budget 2024.
Funding the Transformation resulting from the Policing, Security and Community Safety Act 2024.
A total funding package of €28m provided for new bodies including Fiosrú (replacing GSOC), the Policing and Community Safety Authority, and the Office of the Independent Examiner.
Together with 36 Community Safety Partnerships nationwide and the National Office of Community Safety will strengthen effective cross-agency working in partnership with local communities on public safety.
Maximum jail sentences for those using knifes and other identified offensive weapons increased.
It was announced today (Monday) that a Commencement Order has been signed under the Courts, Civil Law, Criminal Law and Superannuation (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2024 which will increase the maximum sentences for knife related offences, with effect from September 30th, 2024.
The Commencement Order gives effect to Part 9 of the Courts, Civil Law, Criminal Law and Superannuation (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2024, which amends the Firearms and Offensive Weapons Act 1990 to increase the maximum penalties for the following offences under that Act:
Section 9(5) offence of possession in a public place of an article intended to cause injury to, incapacitate or intimidate a person: increased from 5 years to 7 years.
Section 10 offence of trespass with a knife, weapon of offence or other article which has a blade or sharp point: increased from 5 years to 7 years.
Section 11 offence of production of an article capable of inflicting serious injury: increased from 5 years to 7 years.
Section 12 offence of manufacture, importation, sale, hire or loan of prescribed offensive weapons: increased from 7 years to 10 years.
These changes in the law follow recommendations from the knife crime sub-group of the Expert Forum on Anti-Social Behaviour, established in 2020, with first chaired meeting only taking place on September 29th 2021. Four sub-groups have now been established by the Forum to consider the specific issues of the misuse of scramblers and quadbikes, knife crime, responses to Anti-social behaviour (ASB) impacts on housing complexes managed by Local Authorities (LA) or Approved Housing Bodies (AHBs), and the powers available to An Garda Síochána in relation to public order offences. Members of the Forum are drawn from a number of State agencies, including An Garda Síochána, the Probation Service and key Government Departments, as well as a broad representation of community, business, academic and other experts.
Coimisiún na Meán designated as the competent authority to impose penalties under the EU Terrorist Content Online Regulation.
Coimisiún na Meán now has the power to impose administrative fines on hosting service providers for infringements of the Terrorism Content Online Regulation.
Terrorist Content Online Regulation provides for speedy removal of terrorist content online following the issue of removal orders by An Garda Síochána.
Coimisiún na Meán (Irish: Media Commission) has been designated as the competent Irish authority under the EU Terrorist Content Online Regulation (2021/784) to impose penalties on hosting service providers who do not comply with their obligations under that Regulation.
Coimisiún na Meán will now have the power to impose administrative fines on hosting service providers up to 4% of global turnover, for infringements of the Terrorism Content Online Regulation. This designation follows the commencement of Part 7 of the Courts, Civil Law, Criminal Law and Superannuation (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2024, which provides Coimisiún na Meán with the necessary statutory powers.
The Terrorist Content Online Regulation provides an EU wide mechanism for the speedy removal of terrorist content online, by hosting service providers following the issue of removal orders by EU law enforcement agencies. An Garda Síochána is the authority competent in Ireland for issuing removal orders.
Terrorist content refers to material shared online that, directly or indirectly glorifies terrorist acts; advocates the commission of terrorist offences; solicits a person or a group of persons to commit or contribute to the commission of a terrorist offences or to participate in the activities of a terrorist group; provides instruction on the making or use of explosives, firearms or other weapons; or constitutes a threat to commit a terrorist offence.
Almost 100 cases prosecuted under Coco’s Law have now been published.
Legislation criminalising the sharing of, or threatening to share intimate images without a person’s consent, and distributing, publishing or sending a threatening or grossly offensive communication to another person, introduced in 2021 has been reviewed.
Almost 100 cases have been prosecuted by the DPP over the review period, with charges from An Garda Síochána increasing year-on-year.
Success of national awareness campaigns in informing public of the legislation.
The legislation criminalises the sharing of, or threatening to share intimate images, without a person’s consent, with or without intent to cause harm to the victim.
The Act also seeks to target other areas of harmful communications by creating a new offence of distributing, publishing, or sending a threatening or grossly offensive communication with intent to cause harm and to extend the current offence of harassment to deal with communications about a person, as well as communications to a person.
The review was carried out by the Department of Justice and found positive early indicators in terms of prosecutions taken, the number of reports of intimate image abuse made to a hotline for illegal content, and general awareness of the legislation.
The review found that the Office of Director of Public Prosecutions had taken a total of 99 cases in respect of section 2, 3 or 4 of the Act, between its commencement and the end of 2023. This included:
A total of 23 cases prosecuted on indictment in the Circuit Court.
The DPP consented to summary disposal on guilty plea for eight cases.
The DPP directed summary disposal on 68 cases.
One case was prosecuted on indictment in the Central Criminal Court.
The review also found that the number of charges issued by An Garda Síochána had risen between commencement in 2021 and the end of 2023. In 2021, there were 22 charges brought. In 2022, that rose to 95, and in 2023 it rose again to 113.
The review noted independent research from August 2021, which found that 69% thought it was against the law to share intimate images without consent, and 51% thought it was against the law to threaten to share intimate images.
A follow up piece of research conducted in November 2023 found that those figures had jumped to 97% and 96%, after the public awareness campaign.
As part of the awareness campaign, the Department of Justice partnered with Hotline.ie to provide a widely accessible reporting mechanism for victims of intimate image abuse. Once illegal content is reported to Hotline, their experts assess the report and decide on next steps.
Any online service provider served by Hotline.ie with an intimate image abuse notice is responsible for removing the content at source.
The review found that, between September 2021 and December 2023, almost 1,500 reports were made to Hotline.ie, which, after assessment, were found to be intimate image abuse.
Some 1,006 of these were images or videos shared without the person’s consent via publicly accessible web-locations;. Hotline.ie was able to get 92% removed.
Hotline.ie also received more than 400 reports relating to threat to share intimate images. This included 366 cases of sexual extortion and 27 threats to share intimate images for harassment purposes.
Nationwide awareness-raising campaign to warn against danger posed by illegal fireworks and strict penalties misuse
Fines up to €10,000 and 5 years’ imprisonment applying for having fireworks in possession with intent to sell or supply, or if convicted or throwing an ignited firework at a person or property
Campaign launched in collaboration with An Garda Síochána, Foróige, the Irish Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ISPCA), the Irish Guide Dogs for the Blind, and Dublin Fire Brigade
BestBeware This Halloween. Pic: G. Willoughby
Yesterday saw the launch of a nationwide awareness raising campaign, warning against the serious dangers posed by illegal fireworks and the strict penalties for their misuse.
The campaign was launched at Garda Headquarters in the Phoenix Park; in collaboration with Foróige, the Irish Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ISPCA), the Irish Guide Dogs for the Blind, the Fire Brigade service and An Garda Síochána.
This year’s campaign continues to emphasise the physical danger and emotional distress caused by illegal fireworks in our local communities and emphasise the serious penalties that can be imposed, with fines of up to €10,000 and 5 years’ imprisonment applying, for being in your possession of fireworks with intent to sell or supply, or if convicted of throwing an ignited firework at any person or property.
In addition to the awareness raising work in the run up to Halloween 2024, additional efforts are being made by An Garda Síochána to combat the illegal importation, sale and use of fireworks, which is known as ‘Operation Tombola’.
‘Operation Tombola’ combats the importation, sale and distribution of illegal fireworks, through intelligence led operations; visits to local car boot sales; searches and seizures of fireworks, as well as focusing on preventing associated public disorder and anti-social behaviour, through the incremental deployment of resources.
Speaking at the launch, Inspector Ciaran Nunan, (Garda National Community Engagement Bureau) said: “An Garda Síochána target the supply of illegal or unlicensed fireworks under ‘Operation Tombola.’ Those that attempt to profit from the sale of illegal fireworks by putting them into the hands of those that are not licensed to safely use them are proactively targeted by Gardaí nationwide – the fireworks are seized so as to prevent anti-social behaviour and dangerous incidents including possible injury and we will prosecute those responsible. Young people especially need to be fully aware that it is a criminal offence to throw or direct any ignited firework at a person or property. Throughout this next month, Community Policing Gardaí will be visiting schools to speak with children about the dangers and criminal offences associated with fireworks. We are appealing to parents and guardians, particularly those with young children, to be aware of the serious danger of fireworks and the nuisance they cause to communities. If you have information relating to the illegal use or sale of fireworks, please contact your local Garda Station or speak with us on the Garda Confidential Line, Tel: 1800 666 111.”
Chief Fire Officer at Dublin Fire Brigade, Mr Dennis Keeley spoke about the major harmful impact the use of fireworks has not just on people’s quality of life, but on the environment. He said: “Each year, the misuse of fireworks causes life-changing injuries, and leaves tremendous hardship and devastation in its wake. Fireworks cause extensive air pollution in a short amount of time, leaving metal particles, dangerous toxins, harmful chemicals and smoke in the air for hours and days. By increasing awareness, the Fire Brigade services hope to reduce the number of injuries and incidents associated with the misuse of fireworks. The tragedy is that we are likely to see more injuries associated with the misuse of fireworks and these are so preventable.”
The awareness campaign is aimed at the general public, with a particular focus on the younger generation and their parents, as these groups are most likely to engage in the use of illegal fireworks.
This year, the Department of Justice engaged with Foróige, one of Ireland’s leading youth organisations, to carry out nationwide focus groups on attitudes to fireworks among young people and their parents. The unique insights provided by the research will help promote harm reduction and reduced use among the younger audience.
Mr John Fitzgerald, (Foróige area manager for Dublin City) said: “We know from our work with young people around the country that fireworks can mean very different things to different people. They can be exciting, inspiring and also very dangerous and harmful – depending on who you speak with. We were delighted to be part of this campaign and to get the opportunity to sit down with Foróige young people around the country and listen to their experiences and insights on firework use, which helped craft this campaign. We look forward to seeing the finished products of the ads on media platforms nationally and are hopeful that they can influence positive decision-making and ensure that young people, parents and communities are safer this Halloween.”
Mr Tim O’Mahony(Chief Executive Officer of the Irish Guide Dogs for the Blind), also highlighted how Halloween can be a frightening and dangerous time for Guide and Assistance Dogs and their owners. Mr O’Mahony said: “Halloween can be a very nervous and unsettling time for the owners of Guide and Assistance Dogs. Whilst our dogs are highly trained to cope with a level of stress, the anxiety caused by fireworks is beyond what can be expected of any dog to cope with. Every year, our clients report concerns weeks in advance of October 31st, resulting in them needing to take measures to protect the dog as much as possible, for example not being out after dark, and in essence altering their normal, daily routine. Our trainers often have to work with a dog to try to reverse the effects of fireworks and, in some cases, despite every effort the dog is far too traumatised and has to be withdrawn. The owner is then faced with a lengthy life-changing impact of their independence and mobility being severely curtailed whilst they re-join the waiting list to be matched with a suitable dog.”
This was echoed by Mr Cyril Sullivan(Chief Executive of the ISPCA), who stated; “Every year animals are traumatised by the noise of illegal fireworks causing them extreme fear and upset. The ISPCA is urging the public to consider the distress and the dangers that fireworks cause, not just to our pets but the impact it has on our wildlife, and livestock in our communities. Some animals show severe signs of anxiety, and it is important that pet owners ensure their furry friends feel safe and secure, so follow our website tips and advice on how to best support your pet and keep all animals safe this Halloween”.
Disappointed to note that representatives from the Farming Community were not invited to this gathering, latter who have valuable animals, e.g. those who own brood mares. Latter will be heavily in foal around this same Halloween period and will become easily frightened, often leading to the loss of their foal.
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