Gardai launch trainee recruitment drive

An Garda Síochána, in conjunction with the Public Appointments Service, has opened a recruitment competition for Garda trainees.

The competition, which is open from this Wednesday (April 3) until 3pm on April 24 2019, is seeking to attract candidates from across society and with a wide-variety of skills to join An Garda Síochána. As of March 31, there are 14,161 members of An Garda Síochána and there is a Government commitment to grow this to 15,000 by 2021.

The advertising campaign is based on research with Garda students and new recruits who said they joined An Garda Síochána to help people, because it was not like any other job, and it had great variety. The campaign will feature Garda members in a number of situations where every day skills can transfer into policing. The campaign will run across radio, online and social media from today, and TV and online video channels from April 12.

In order to encourage candidates from minority communities, An Garda Síochána will consider alterations to the Garda uniform to take account of religious and ethnic requirements subject to operational, and health and safety obligations.

For example, An Garda Síochána is to allow the wearing of the turban for members of the Sikh community and the hijab for members of the Muslim community. An Garda Síochána has identified such matters as a major barrier to some people considering becoming a Garda member. An Garda Síochána is also carrying out research with communities who are under-represented in An Garda Síochána to identify what more the organisation needs to do to encourage them to join An Garda Síochána either as a Garda member, Garda staff or Garda reserve.