Gardaí warned discounts at takeaways is seen as corruption

listermint

bubblypop wrote: »

Like the postman, or binman, or ambulance driver etc etc....
All of whom are sometimes given a little token of appreciation, very insulting to throw it back in someone's face!

It's not though. I can't accept that but I appreciate the gesture is a simple response .

We've to do yearly ethics courses in our place we aren't allowed accept anything from a customer or give them anything at all.

What makes a guard different. Can they not use words like. No thank you ?

KaneToad

bubblypop wrote: »

Blue flu was in 1998.
How exactly is Drew Harris standing up to the GRA?

Guards threatened industrial action in their most recent pay award.

It is illegal for them to strike yet they were threatening to do this. I think it diminishes their authority by trying to enforce the law and simultaneously threatening to knowingly break it.

KaneToad

KaneToad wrote: »

Guards threatened industrial action in their most recent pay award.

It is illegal for them to strike yet they were threatening to do this. I think it diminishes their authority by trying to enforce the law and simultaneously threatening to knowingly break it.

It is not actually illegal

Mrs OBumble

Edgware wrote: »

So should the Residents Association give the Community Garda a box of biscuits at Christmas as a gesture of appreciation or is that corruption?

Well in New Zealand, the community cop can accept a couple of biscuits to accompany the cup of coffee he has with you, but if you give him a box of biscuits they will be accepted, registered and then regifted to a genuinely voluntary community group.

the beer revolu

About 15 years ago I worked doing wine deliveries. One Christmas I delivered a case of wine to a Garda station, addressed to a Garda from a solicitor. Even then, I thought that was a bit barefaced!

saabsaab

the beer revolu wrote: »

About 15 years ago I worked doing wine deliveries. One Christmas I delivered a case of wine to a Garda station, addressed to a Garda from a solicitor. Even then, I thought that was a bit barefaced!

Why? Would it make a difference if it was a bottle of whiskey or a box of biscuits. It's not brown envelopes stuffed with cash and there is a difference.

Mad_maxx

Stovepipe wrote: »

There will always be bent gardai,just like there are bent ordinary citizens. We hold them to a higher standard than the ordinary citizen, though, which is why we expect them to follow the rules they are taught about in Templemore. But, gardai get very cynical about the ordinary citizen very quickly, which is why some of them take the piss.

whatever gave you the idea that irish people hold our police force to a high standard ?

TuringBot47

Mad_maxx wrote: »

whatever gave you the idea that irish people hold our police force to a high standard ?

On the flip side, what gave you the idea they're not?

American cops couldn't understand an unarmed police force.

Edgware

Mad_maxx wrote: »

whatever gave you the idea that irish people hold our police force to a high standard ?

Independent surveys have shown this even allowing for bad behaviour by some Gardai. Most people are fair minded and see the good work Gardai do both in their job and with community groups. Our family will always be grateful to our local Gardai for their support far beyond the call of duty when my father was viciously assaulted by Provo thugs. He was doing his job as a Postman when the thugs dragged him from van at gunpoint, beat him and left him tied up on the side of the road at 6.30 a.m. on a January morning. It was particularly insulting as our grandfather had served 15 months in Ballykinlar during the War of Independence, something these thugs knew.

Mad_maxx

Edgware wrote: »

Independent surveys have shown this even allowing for bad behaviour by some Gardai. Most people are fair minded and see the good work Gardai do both in their job and with community groups. Our family will always be grateful to our local Gardai for their support far beyond the call of duty when my father was viciously assaulted by Provo thugs. He was doing his job as a Postman when the thugs dragged him from van at gunpoint, beat him and left him tied up on the side of the road at 6.30 a.m. on a January morning. It was particularly insulting as our grandfather had served 15 months in Ballykinlar during the War of Independence, something these thugs knew.

Surveys regularly show high satisfaction with AGS, this despite the litany of stores in the past two decades with respect of corruption and scandal

Like I said, we do not hold our police force to a high standard

KaneToad

bubblypop wrote: »

It is not actually illegal

Well if you want to get into specifics, it is illegal for the representative bodies to induce it's members (guards) to strike. It's contrary to the Offences against the State Act as well as the Garda Síochána Act.

Guards (and Defence Forces) are also not covered by the Industrial Relations Act 1990, which gives workers the legal right to strike.

The threatening by the rep bodies to strike was definitely illegal.

Mimon

It's all about optics and even a small gratuity to people with power should not be allowed.

There are people in my company involved in audits of other companies i.e have power to either make life very easy or very difficult for them. They get all tons of stuff from these companies at Christmas.

Funnily enough the other 90% of employees with no power as they do not carry out audits get nothing.

Not sure how it is allowed.

Mimon

Mrs OBumble wrote: »

Well in New Zealand, the community cop can accept a couple of biscuits to accompany the cup of coffee he has with you, but if you give him a box of biscuits they will be accepted, registered and then regifted to a genuinely voluntary community group.

Modern, open, professional and right way to do things vs our mickey mousing amateur hour of doing things. We are still very immature as asociety.

Potential-Monke

I could see this coming, so here's my experience of it.

During my time as a Garda (9/10 years), I did receive discounts on mainly food or tea in petrol stations or the local chipper/take away. I never looked at it as a payment for preferential treatment. It never dawned on me to look at it like that, especially at the beginning as a brand new Garda with no actual proper experience of it. In previous jobs, I've received discounts because of familiarity or continued custom, I just assumed this was the same, but more immediate because of the familiarity of the uniform. Older members would say it's a perk of the job, always has been that way. To clarify, I never accepted anything more than a discount on something, I never took anything for free, even if it meant throwing money at them which I had to do on a few occasions.

Even then, free just didn't feel right to me for anything above a cup of tea or pastries about to be thrown in the bin (literally standing over the bin while offering them) at half 5 in the morning at a petrol station. The station had the contract for refueling, so even with the loss of ~50c on the cost of the cup, milk, sugar and teabag/coffee grains, it didn't feel "wrong" to me, and was more a case of "well ye are giving us a crap load for the petrol so have a free tea/non-sellable pastry" situation. During my time, I saw plenty taxi drivers and delivery drivers getting the same treatment so never really considered it an issue (even moreso because I rarely drank tea and bought a mineral at full price instead).

There was one take-away (Thai) that I started getting discounts at after a year of quite a lot of purchases, but they didn't know I was a Garda at the time, as when I went there for a theft while in uniform they recognised me and said as much. So discounts on regular, small items was never an issue in my mind. I never got a discount on anything else because of being a Garda, and I'll again say it never made me put one place/person above another, I would rather no discount if that's what people thought.

But I did see other members take the mick and get discounts where they could. In general, they were hated by the rest because of it, and some would say it to them, but these members are the same arseholes you get in every job who just don't care. The bigger corruption problem I saw was in management, but again it was well engrained as "just the way it is". I've said this in other threads, but I've never seen or been part of a big corruption issue, the biggest one was the knowledge that tickets could be cancelled by someone of Inspector rank or higher, of which there were a good few different members and I had no knowledge of which one was doing it. I didn't want to know tbh, you didn't go up against the brass, again because that's just the way it was. Let me clarify that the vast majority of members I worked with or interacted with were above board and lovely people who just wanted to do their job, and like every job there are arseholes too.

It's good that Harris is getting rid of the issues. I still don't consider a free or discounted cup of tea/coffee or pastry is corruption. I just don't. I can see the other side of it, but I don't consider it an issue at all, simply because it was given to multiple different groups of people who are outside of the government jobs. Anyway, just giving a quick overview of my experience of it during my time. I'm not going to be drawn into any back and forth over this, and I'm not going to get involved in a debate over it. I left because I didn't want to end up front page news over something so trivial (among many other reasons) as I saw the way it was going and wanted nothing to do with it. Ignore all the good work I did and concentrate on the fact I sometimes got a discount on take-aways and the odd free tea/pastries, all the while not following up on assaults on members, myself included x 3.

I just hope the intent is to get rid of the bigger issues of corruption and not to hang out the bottom of the ladder for trivial things just to make it look like something is being done. I still believe the vast majority of Gardai are honest, decent hard working people just trying to do their job in very difficult circumstances.

Edgware

Mad_maxx wrote: »

Surveys regularly show high satisfaction with AGS, this despite the litany of stores in the past two decades with respect of corruption and scandal

Like I said, we do not hold our police force to a high standard

Mind that you dont fall off that high horse. Its a pity everyone isnt as perfect as you