Time spent dealing with mentally unwell people ‘an issue’ – senior garda

THE Chief Superintendent for the Mayo, Roscommon and Longford division has admitted that dealing with people with mental-health challenges is ‘an issue’ for gardaí, who are ‘not qualified’ to deal with such cases.

Chief Supt Ray McMahon was responding to a query from Michael Loftus, who said that the London Metropolitan Police spend 40 percent of their time dealing with mental health.

Speaking from London, Cllr Loftus said he was told by a senior London police officer that, from October 1, a significant amount of this work is to be handed over to the country’s health services.

“This is something that is really affecting all police departments, and when we hear of situations of trying to save funding, this is an area that has to be looked at,” said Cllr Loftus, who was speaking at the recent meeting of the Mayo Joint Policing Committee.

Chief Supt McMahon said that the Gardaí are currently conducting research to quantify the amount of time spent dealing with mental-health issues.

“We are looking at what best way we can combine various agencies to come and tackle this problem, particularly the out-of-hours problem,” he said.

“A lot of these mental-health issues take a lot of garda time to actually deal with, and then there’s the question of what’s the safest for those vulnerable people.”

Chief Supt McMahon said gardaí were awaiting the results of a Limerick-based pilot programme involving a Community Access Support Team (CAST).

Former acting Minister for Justice Simon Harris said in May that: “It is intended that the development of the CAST approach will enhance diversionary practices for those experiencing crisis and situational trauma that leads to mental-health difficulties.”

The pilot project is due start before the end of year.