Cllr says parts of Cork city are 'no-go areas' as people have lost faith in Gardaí

Speaking to Newstalk Breakfast, the independent councillor said he is often contacted by constituents telling him how unsafe they feel in the city.

"When I say there are certain areas that are no-go, there are certainly parts of the city that people feel at-risk in and feel worried out. I have constituents contacting me, texting me or engaging in social media with me telling me how they feel unsafe in the city.”

"How they're afraid for their children going into the city at night, how they're afraid for their elderly parents going into the city doing their day-to-day business,” he continued.

"The reality here is that while Gardaí have limited resources, we've never had so many Gardaí in Cork city then we do in the last 10 years.”

Mr O’Flynn explained that people have “lost faith” in policing because people don’t see them “out on the beat.”

"Gardaí on the ground are doing a marvellous job, but I speak to Gardaí every day of the week nearly engaging on different issues and they're telling me 'Look our pin is to the collar, we don't have enough resources, we don't have enough people on the ground’.”

"We really need to re-look at what's happening in the Garda Síochána,” he said.

"It was pointed out yesterday to me that we have a pile of Guards doing administration work behind desks, we have a lack of availability of cars in the city.”

"We certainly, to my mind, have a lack of availability of the Garda patrolling, the Garda on the beat - the Garda walking down the street, the presence of the Gardaí".

The former deputy Lord Mayor of Cork said that the situation in the city is just getting worse.

It comes following a violent street brawl that happened on St. Patrick's Street on Monday.

An innocent bystander, a man in his 80s was hospitalised after suffering injuries to his hand after being pushed to the ground during the fight.

"Certainly we have seen an increase in more violent type of attack or behaviour. This is not an isolated incident on Monday last - we had a stabbing a couple of weeks ago in the city centre in the middle of the day.”

"We've had a situation where we've had violence breakout in the middle of traffic again in MacCurtain Street about two weeks ago, and I've witnessed myself open-drug dealing."