MICHAEL WALSH NEWS DESK A caller shares with RTE’s (Ireland’s National Broadcaster) Live Line. They describe another on-duty garda asking to jump the queue to access a public EV charger.

Questions are being raised about Garda readiness after it emerged some patrol cars must rely on public EV chargers.

A Live line caller told Kieran Cuddihy about two on-duty gardaí. They asked to skip the queue at a public EV charger in Killarney over the New Year. This request was because they did not have a charger at their station.

The caller, Jack, said the gardaí were driving a Kia electric vehicle. When he asked, ‘surely have a charger’ at the station, one garda replied: ‘No, we don’t. We’ve been waiting months. We have no charger actually, we come here.’

They also told him that their colleagues in Killorglin also have no charger.

When Jack asked what happens if the car needs to be charged at the start of a shift, the garda replied:

‘If we get a call, we can’t go anywhere. There are times when we may have to queue for one to two hours to charge the car.’

Jack expressed disbelief. He asked what kind of Garda management would allow something to lack the infrastructure for electric charging. There are police all over the country who have electric cars.’

Kieran Cuddihy said he recently saw a police car charging at a public service station near the N7 in Kilcullen.

He described it as an odd image at the time. He had assumed patrol cars would be fully charged before leaving their stations. He said he now realizes they probably don’t have one either.

It was also highlighted that both host Kieran and caller Jack had a quick installation. When they ordered their personal electric cars, they had their home chargers installed within one to two weeks.

Kieran remarked that he doesn’t know how the police are driving around the South West. They are searching for and need to use the SuperValu chargers.

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