This article is from page 10 of the 2006-04-11 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 10 JPG
A CLARE Garda sergeant received €23,041 in overpayments last year, figures released by the Dept of Justice show.
The statistics released record a massive increase in Garda overtime in Clare last year, with the top ten earners receiving €167,065, compared to the €127,904 paid out in 2004.
In all, the force across the country received €77 million in overtime last year – a slight decrease on the €84 million received by the force in 2004.
The department also revealed that it cost €478,769 to fund the continuing Garda operation at Shannon Airport in 2005, mounted in response to the continuing transport of US troops.
The figures, which were released yesterday, show that the highest Garda earners in Clare were an inspector, three sergeants and a garda (see table).
Inspectors basic earnings are around €51,000, while sergeants earn between €40,209 and €46,299 on normal duties. A garda’s payscale goes from €22,212 to €39,914 after 17 years service.
“The reason that the overtime is €77 million is that the Minister for Justice, Michael McDowell, has failed to increase adequately the number of gardaí. We don’t have enough gardaí, it is an obvious problem,” said Fine Gael’s Justice spokesman, Jim O’Keefe TD.
He said that the Garda representative organisations had assured him “the issue of overtime doesn’t play a part in the opposition to the proposed Garda reserve”.