Many Garda stations are not connected to the Garda Pulse network, according to Department of Justice figures.

Minister for Justice Frances Fitzgerald said 167 stations were not connected to the Garda computer network, but that gardaí can "contact the Garda Information Services Centre to provide relevant details to trained civilian call-takers who enter the details on the Pulse system".

Enhancing rural access to the Garda network by connecting non-networked sites to the network was being examined, she said.

Sinn Féin justice spokesman Jonathan O’Brien, who sought the information in a parliamentary question, said Garda management “want to close as many stations as possible”.

Gardaí in non-Pulse connected stations report into a centralised centre in Connacht. The Garda Inspectorate and the Garda Commissioner favoured a regional model, he said.

Mr O’Brien, who was appointed justice spokesman after this year’s general election, said “it’s not politically popular but international best practice has shown and the Garda Inspectorate has said that we have too many Garda stations for an effective policing service”.

Election manifesto

This conflicts with Sinn Féin’s 2016 election manifesto, which says “we will reverse the closure of Garda stations – these closures have provided minimal ‘savings’ to the State of €556,000 per annum and are a shameful legacy of this government”.

However, the Cork North-Central TD said the Garda Inspectorate view was that “to have an effective police service in the 21st century, you’re going to have some stations that are going to have to close”.

Referring to the Garda Inspectorate’s report on the service, he said: “You don’t need an actual police station to have a police presence.”

Mr O’Brien pointed to the inspectorate’s call for a civilianisation programme of elements of the service, which he said “could release 1,500 gardaí for active duty in a matter of months”, while the force would be recruiting 600 to 700.

Gardaí should not be at the front desk in a station to deal with passport applications, he said. That was a job for civilians.

He said gardaí on duty reporting and investigating crimes should not actually be designating what category of crime is involved, in part because of excessive paperwork and also for improving crime classification.

Mr O’Brien said a “garda in Cork might designate a crime as burglary while another garda elsewhere might report it as trespassing even though it’s the same type of offence”.

The Minister pointed to the launch in June of the Garda Síochána Modernisation and Renewal Programme 2016-2021 which aimed to “professionalise, modernise and renew An Garda Síochána” to meet current and future challenges.