No new Gardaí for Offaly from this week's record graduation

There will be no new Garda recruits making their way to Offaly stations following Thursday's record graduation of 198 from the Garda College in Templemore. 

This week's group brings to 1,000, the number of new Gardai since the recruitment moratorium on public sector recruitment was lifted, with 56 women and 142 men 'passing-out' in this latest class.

This is the ninth group to commence training under the new BA Applied Policing Programme, which was implemented to make sure the force recruits and trains the very best in policing personnel. 

Of the 198, 10 will be stationed in the Laois/Offaly Division in the coming weeks, but all ten will be arriving for duty at Portlaoise Garda Station. 

One Offaly man passed out on Thursday and Kevin Nugent from Belmont has been stationed in the busy Dublin Metropolitan Region station of Dundrum.

The absence of any new recruits to Offaly stations will bring about debates about staffing levels in the county, which is still home to numerous part-time stations.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________
If you have a story for us, sports news, an event happening in your area, or if you want to submit pictures or videos, contact the Offaly Express team via e-mail to justin.kelly@iconicnews.ie, or through our Facebook.