2025 Garda recruitment campaign launched with 5,000 new gardaí to be recruited over 5 years

The 2025 Garda recruitment campaign will officially open for applications on Thursday, 6 February. 

The Budget 2025 saw the provision of over €2.48 billion to An Garda Síochána to help support the recruitment of new members, staff and reserves. 

Many efforts have been recently made to make the job more attractive to new new recruits, including the removal of previous barriers such as age limitations. 

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The maximum age of entry for new garda recruits now stands at 50, a dramatic increase from the previous limit of 35. As well as this, the mandatory retirement age has been increased to 62. 

Of course, a long-time barrier for many people who wanted to join the force in the past were the financial constraints during the training process. In response to this, the allowance for trainee gardaí has increased to €354 a week. 

Speaking at the launch of the recruitment campaign, the newly-appointed Minister for Justice Jim O’Callaghan said that the Programme for Government has committed to providing funding to recruit at least 5,000 new gardaí over the next five years.

Minister O'Callaghan said increasing the size of An Garda Síochána was a "particular priority" for him. He added: "Improving our capacity to recruit Gardaí and train them effectively will be a focus of mine as Minister."

Further measures have been outlined in the Programme for Government intended to strengthen the organisation, expand its resources and modernise support to tackle crime. 

These include a reform of the Garda recruitment and training processes to increase capacity; examining the introduction of an accelerated graduate entry programme to An Garda Síochána; and implementation of a new Garda Capital Plan to deliver modern, well-equipped Garda stations across the country.

Recruitment has accelerated following the forced closure of the Garda College during the Covid-19 pandemic, with last year's recruitment campaign receiving almost 6,400 applications. One third of these applications were from the 35-49 age group which was the first time that those in that age bracket could apply.