Mr. Patrick Mulley:

On the budget figures about which the Minister was also asked this morning, in 2008 the budget was running at approximately €23 million for the PDF side of it. On one of the other points, the payments to RDF members are being reduced to €2.5 million.

On the availability to train, we need to correct what the Minister stated this morning. Nobody, under normal circumstances, is paid a gratuity unless he or she has completed a set criteria of training. That criteria of training to qualify for the gratuity is that they must have recorded 48 voluntary hours in the year, they must have undertaken their annual range practice and they must also complete one week's full-time training. A gratuity was never paid to those who did not train. That is something that needs to be corrected.

On the numbers or members who are available for training, when the big cuts came in 2008, we enjoyed 66,000 man days, that is, the allocation given to the RDF. That number of man days was halved and was reduced to 33,000. The arithmetic is simple. If one has 66,000 one year, one cannot bring the same number of members to camp the following year. We experienced the same through the 1980s, when the number of man days was reduced. At the time there were approximately 1,500 in the FCA and we could not bring those members to camp. It is not fair to say, if one cuts the number of man days from 66,000 to 33,000, that one will have the same number of members attending training. One cannot have it like that because it is not available for them to take up.

On the budget that was allocated, the CRE, which was referred to this morning in the Minister's statement, reported back in December 2011. It was claimed, in the CRE report, that the McCarthy recommendations had been met, which was to reduce the numbers in the RDF by two thirds. It can be seen that we did not have part in reducing the numbers. They were forced upon us. It was also claimed in the CRE report that the budget of the RDF had been reduced by €5.8 million. We had no part in that, yet it was something that was imposed on us. That is the impact we are looking at here. There has been attrition in the numbers. In the past five years we have lost 16% of our numbers year on year, every year.

The Chairman raised a question on the number of members who were non-effective. Surprisingly, the non-effective members run at 9% per annum.