By Brendan Anderson

New recruits to the North’s police force are being trained in sub-standard facilities because the British government refuses to fully fund a new academy, it has been claimed.

And in a twist to what has become a long-running saga, the Irish government is to be asked to make up the shortfall in funding for the proposed new college.

The replacing of the dilapidated premises at Garnerville on the outskirts of east Belfast was cited as a priority by the Patten Recommendations on Police Reform and by Police Oversight Commissioner Al Hutchinson, a former senior officer with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

Senior police officers claim their recruits are housed and trained in “deplorable conditions” at Garnerville. It was revealed Monday that trainees spend much of their 31-week training period billeted, two at a time, in rooms no bigger than a prison cell where they sleep and study.

Experts say police recruits need facilities similar to the FBI’s impressive training academy at Quantico, Virginia. Ideally, the new college would include a purpose-built “neighborhood” with bars, restaurants, houses, a gas station and a hotel, to provide a realistic setting for training. At Garnerville, the only training props available are a battered out-of-date telephone kiosk and a bus stop.

In February 2004, the British government offered £90 million ($176.8 million) towards the cost of the college, earmarked for Cookstown, Co. Tyrone. The project had been expected to be completed next year but it has taken so long to get off the ground that the price has spiraled to £130 million ($255.5 million).

The Policing Board, the body which oversees the Police Service of Northern Ireland, said Monday it was sending its chairman and vice chairman to Dublin for informal talks with the Irish government. The board said it would ask the Irish government to contribute to the shortfall.

Taoiseach (prime minister) Bertie Ahern has already promised millions of euro in economic aid to the North once devolved government is established.

Unionist Assembly members who would not publicly approve of the approach to the Irish government, are to make another appeal to the British government to make up the funding shortfall. The issue was the subject of a debate Tuesday in the Assembly which is currently sitting in “transitional form.”

Gregory Campbell of the Democratic Unionist Party said before the debate, “If we are going to recruit a first class police service for the people of Northern Ireland for the future, the one thing everybody interested in good policing agrees on is the need for a state-of-the art training facility.

“Everyone from the chief constable to the Policing Board to academics and experts in the field know this kind of facility is required. As things stand, with recruits stuck in the out-of-date college in Garnerville, the conditions are totally unsuitable. They are more than unfortunate. They are reprehensible.”