Paul Kehoe (Wexford, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Following the launch of the air ambulance service in 2012, RACO submitted a claim for lieutenants and captains tasked with flying the helicopter service. The public service pay agreements do not allow for a cost increase in claims. Instead of introducing a new allowance, it was agreed through conciliation and arbitration to pay the pilots the equivalent of the security duty allowance, SDA, for this duty. In 2019, RACO submitted a claim for the allowance to be extended to commandants and lieutenants colonel tasked to perform duties.

SDA is normally paid to officers at commandant rank and above. Payments of SDA to commandants ceased in October 1990 arising from recommendations in the report of the Gleeson commission. A limited number of commandants are paid SDA where their appointment is brigadier or equivalent duty. An offer was made to RACO to pay the equivalent SDA to commandants. As stated, the matter is still ongoing through the CNA scheme.

I mentioned the tax credit. The loss of recruits is a long-term issue. On average, 22% do not complete training but this goes back years and it is not a new phenomenon of the past two, three or four years. People come into the Army and they often do not get what they expect. For anybody who goes into a job, whether in the Garda, the Army or elsewhere, while pay might be an issue, I do not believe it is the biggest issue. I am sure that everybody going into a new job looks at the pay scales and at what they are going to get after one year, when their training is completed, or after year two, three or four, and at what are the possibilities of remaining and what they can get out of it. I do not believe pay is the biggest issue when a person leaves during training.

It is an issue I ask commanding officers about all of the time and they tell me they believe military life is not suitable for all people and some may not be able for the robustness of it. Training can be very robust and some people just do not like it. If it is not suitable for them, it is better that we lose them during training, rather than training them and then having them leave three or four months after training. If we lose them during training, most of the time, we are able to get somebody else in to replace them.

I stated in the Dáil seven or eight months ago that I wanted a review of recruitment. It was one of the recommendations in the high-level implementation plan and the independent pay commission. I had already stated I was going to have a review and Mr. Pádraig Love has been appointed to that. There is a process going through, although I will not give the committee a definitive time as to when I expect that report.

With regard to the specialties, the technician pay review is under way and it is in the high-level implementation plan. The provision for identifying further incentivised measures will be linked to the next pay agreement and it is also in the high-level implementation plan. We are putting a plan in place so when we go to the next phase of the public service pay talks, we will have a good case to make in and around the recruitment and retention challenges in the Defence Forces.

The Deputy knows I cannot change core pay, which is a matter for the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform. If the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, in the mid-life of the public service stability agreement, changes core pay, the Deputy will be the first to ask why teachers, nurses and gardaí do not get the same. The public service stability agreement concludes in 2020. There will be a renegotiation of the plan and I very much look forward to that.

We have a big job of work to do in putting a very strong case together for members of the Defence Forces so we get the best outcome from that. Whatever that outcome, I feel everybody needs to put their shoulder to the wheel. Anybody will know about the challenges, which are out there in the media. I have never hidden the challenges we have within the Defence Forces.