A Garda sergeant is suing the Garda Commissioner and the State for more than €32,000 expenses as a result of the difficulties he encountered during his transfer to the Aran Islands.
The Circuit Civil Court in Dublin heard this week how a new Garda sergeant had started looking for a home in which to settle on an Aran Island with his wife and family but faced considerable difficulties. The now retired Garda sergeant Christopher Joyce told the court that there had been a “reluctance” by the islanders to sell property to “outsiders”. Mr Joyce (60 ) is suing for more than €32,000 expenses related to his transfer in 2000 from Ballina, Co Mayo, to Kilronan sub-district on Inishmore with responsibility for the smaller islands of Inismaan and Inisheer.
Mr Joyce told the court how he had searched for a new home but could find none for sale. He eventually found a site for sale in 2003 but faced issues over legal title. Planning permission had been refused on the basis that he was not a native islander as laid down in the Galway County Council’s development plan. Mr Joyce’s defence barrister, Cliona Kimber, further explained that as her client was a non-native he could not buy a house on the islands, and he had sold his home in Ballina and moved to a new home in Glenard Avenue, Salthill.
Counsel for the Garda Commissioner and the Minister for Justice argued that Mr Joyce had been fully paid lodging, travel, and subsistence allowance. It was also denied that Mr Joyce was entitled to any further money. Mr Joyce told the court that he had travelled from the mainland to Inishmore and to the other islands by ferry or aircraft and that he had been paid a €7,963 lodging allowance for a 15-month period after his transfer. He added that he was suing for over €17,000 house purchase expenses and just over €14,000 house sale expenses as well as furniture removal costs.
Mr Joyce further maintained that it was a condition of his contract that he, like any other garda on transfer, would be entitled to repayment of his removal expenses in accordance with a 1998 Garda directive, but said reimbursement had wrongfully been refused.
Insp Anne Wedgeworth of the Garda finance directorate said it had been decided Sergeant Joyce was not entitled to house purchase expenses as he had bought his new home in Salthill, outside a permitted 15-mile limit from the Garda station. She agreed there was no mention of a 15-mile limit in the 1998 Garda directive and the limit referred to previous regulations. She said Sgt Joyce had abandoned his house purchase expenses claim in 2004, and had made a new claim for house sale expenses which by then was out of time and would have involved a nine-months forfeiture of lodging allowances which Mr Joyce was unwilling to concede.
Judge Deery has reserved judgment in the matter.
