{"id":491971,"date":"2026-06-10T06:12:13","date_gmt":"2026-06-10T06:12:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/491971\/"},"modified":"2026-06-10T06:12:13","modified_gmt":"2026-06-10T06:12:13","slug":"first-pictures-of-fleet-of-multi-million-euro-limousines-and-executive-vans-brought-in-for-irelands-eu-presidency","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/491971\/","title":{"rendered":"First pictures of fleet of multi-million euro limousines and executive vans brought in for Ireland’s EU presidency"},"content":{"rendered":"

The vehicles will be used to ferry prime ministers and other VIPs to high profile meetings around Ireland from next month\"Some<\/p>\n

Some of the dozens of luxury vehicles procured by Ireland for the EU presidency. (Image: Irish Mirror)<\/p>\n

These are some of the almost 100 luxury vehicles that Ireland has procured for the upcoming EU presidency – at a cost of more than \u20ac6 million.<\/p>\n

The limousines – including Mercedes-Benz, Audi and BMWs – as well as executive minivans were all photographed at Farmleigh in Dublin\u2019s Phoenix Park in recent days.<\/p>\n

They are set to be used to ferry prime ministers, diplomats and other VIPs around Ireland for high level meetings during Ireland\u2019s six month presidency that starts on July 1.<\/p>\n

As part of the preparations for the high profile and high risk presidency, Ireland earlier this year decided to bring in some 96 top of the range vehicles – at a cost of some \u20ac6.5 million.<\/p>\n

\"Some<\/p>\n

Some of the dozens of luxury vehicles procured by Ireland for the EU presidency.(Image: Irish Mirror)<\/p>\n

The contract includes 40 executive cars and 44 minivans – as well as the hiring 12 armoured limousines to be used to protect high risk VIPs.<\/p>\n

The cost for the hiring of the armoured vehicles is around \u20ac1 million – while the tax payer is forking out \u20ac5.5 million for the normal limousines and minivans.<\/p>\n

The armoured vehicles are to be hired for November when a number high profile summits and ministerial-level meetings are due to take place.<\/p>\n

\"They<\/p>\n

They were photographed in Dublin’s Farmleigh over the weekend.(Image: Irish Mirror)<\/p>\n

They will be driven by specially-trained armed Garda detectives.<\/p>\n

The other, non armoured, vehicles will be driven by civilian chauffeurs. The multi million euro contract for the cars is just a fraction of the money the state is spending for the presidency.<\/p>\n

Ireland is expected to fork out around \u20ac300 million for the six month term.<\/p>\n

A huge portion of that has been earmarked for policing – with around \u20ac125 million set aside for vital garda overtime during the presidency.<\/p>\n

Gardai will have to work overtime and days off to cope with the massive demands on the force during the term – on top of normal policing duties.<\/p>\n

And the limousines are not the only vehicles that have been brought in for the presidency.<\/p>\n

Gardai have bought two of these \u20ac500,000 Stoof armoured vehicles for the Emergency Response Unit.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

The German-made Stoof Armoured Tactical Truck that has now been delivered to the Garda for use by the elite Emergency Response Unit (Image: irish Mirror)<\/p>\n

And the force has also bought two Italian-made water cannon – at a cost of some \u20ac1.5 million.<\/p>\n

Subscribe to our newsletter for the latest news from the Irish Mirror direct to your inbox: Sign up here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The vehicles will be used to ferry prime ministers and other VIPs to high profile meetings around Ireland…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":491972,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[5148,61,60,43],"class_list":["post-491971","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-european-union","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/491971","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=491971"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/491971\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/491972"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=491971"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=491971"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=491971"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}