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Recorded Crime Detection 2023

Fixed Payment Offences

Fixed Payment Notices issued for Public Order, Parking & Cycling offences down in 2023

Online ISSN: 2711-9971

CSO statistical publication, 27 November 2024, 11am

Lifting of Under Reservation Categorisation

Following the publication of the fifth Review of the Quality of Crime Statistics in October 2023, the Central Statistics Office (CSO) has lifted the 'Under Reservation' categorisation around Recorded Crime Statistics. This is possible because An Garda Síochána have introduced a range of quality measures over the last number of years which have resulted in sustained improvement in the quality of the underlying crime data. These changes give a level of assurance to users that they can rely on Recorded Crime Statistics.

For further information see our Lifting of Under Reservation categorisation for Recorded Crime Statistics FAQ page.

Fixed Payment Notices can be issued by An Garda Siochana for a wide variety of offences, including many road traffic and some public order offences. They provide an offender the opportunity to pay a fine to avoid prosecution. In December 2020, additional Fixed Payment Notices were introduced for breaches of COVID-19 regulations.

The Garda Fixed Charge Processing System (FCPS) database is used to administer the issuing of Fixed Payment Notices. The number of offences for which Fixed Payment Notices were issued, excluding terminated Notices, for years 2017 to 2023 is given in Table 6.1.

Users should note when looking at this table that there were varying COVID-19 restrictions in place for 2020 and 2021. These had an impact on levels of crime, for example, reduced traffic volumes, increased Garda road checkpoints, closure of licensed premises, etc.

The results show that.

The number of fixed payment notices issued for Public Order offences were down 22% to 5,217 in 2023, the lowest it has been since 2017.
Fixed payment notices issued for parking offences at 25,924 were down by 12% from 2022 and by 18% from the 31,679 fixed payment notices issued for this offence in 2021.
There were 562 fixed payment notices issued for Cycling Offences in 2023, and this was almost half the figure of 1,077 for those issued in 2022.
The number of fixed charge notices issued fell for most other offences except for Unaccompanied Driver offences, Failing to Display L or N plates, Holding a Mobile Phone while Driving and No Insurance. See Figure 6.1 and Table 6.1.

X-axis label	Percentage Change
Public Order offences	-22
Drink Driving offences	0
Speeding offences	-7
Holding a Mobile Phone while Driving	3
Seat Belt (incl. child restraint) offences	-7
No Tax	-7
No Insurance	0
No NCT	-7
Failing to Display L or N plates	9
Unaccompanied Learner Driver	13
Vehicle Roadworthiness offences	-7
Motorway offences	-26
Parking offences	-12
Cycling offences	-48
Carriage of Goods (HGV etc), Trailers, Taxis, Luas offences	-15

Table 6.1 Fixed Payment Notice offences issued by An Garda Síochána, 2017-2023

Table 6.1 Fixed Payment Notice offences¹issued by An Garda Síochána, 2017-2023²
	Fixed Payment Notice offences
Type of Offence	2017	2018	2019	2020	2021	2022	2023
1a. Public Order offences³	7,635	8,472	8,128	5,469	5,632	6,697	5,217
1b. Breaches of Public Health restrictions⁴	0	0	0	57	23,067	8	0

2a. Drink Driving offences³	1,418	1,344	1,069	614	605	777	774
2b. Speeding offences	141,451	132,048	132,731	175,692	174,585	160,084	148,451
2c. Holding a Mobile Phone while Driving	27,815	30,800	28,651	24,120	23,560	18,401	18,886
2d. Seat Belt (incl. child restraint) offences	10,392	11,121	10,804	8,342	6,899	5,521	5,154

3a. No Tax	37,761	38,750	34,656	33,513	30,764	34,666	32,339
3b. No Insurance	7,312	7,606	7,071	6,791	5,027	4,339	4,349
3c. No NCT	8,891	9,083	9,185	5,944	4,706	4,746	4,393

4a. Failing to Display L or N plates	4,152	3,895	4,614	5,217	5,665	5,205	5,653
4b. Unaccompanied Learner Driver	5,876	5,016	5,957	6,655	7,549	7,451	8,427

5a. Vehicle Roadworthiness offences	2,670	3,094	3,207	3,433	2,857	2,385	2,229
5b. Motorway offences	147	124	120	151	158	107	79
5c. Parking offences	27,846	32,719	31,932	31,182	31,679	29,482	25,924
5d. Other Driving offences	18,205	22,197	22,230	17,125	16,715	16,795	15,868

6a. Cycling offences	1,284	1,406	1,398	1,175	883	1,077	562
6b. Carriage of Goods (HGV etc), Trailers, Taxis, Luas offences	237	312	334	396	293	181	153
¹The range of offences for which Fixed Payment Notices apply has changed several times within reference period 2017 - 2023.
²Data extracted 23rd September 2024.
³ The set of offences for which Fixed Charge Notices or Fixed Penalty Notices are applied is a subset of all such offences on PULSE.
⁴A large volume of Fixed Payment Notices were issued by An Garda Siochana for Breaches of Public Health Restrictions in Quarter 1 2021. This arose because the facility to fully record all Fixed Charge Notices in respect of Breaches of COVID-19 restrictions was only available on the FCPS from 7 December 2020. See background notes above for further information.