Pat Buckley (Cork East, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I have worked on stuff like this when it was raised through my office. There is a shortage of members in our Defence Forces. I understand where Mr. Martin is coming from. There are people in their late 30s or early 40s who want to go into the Defence Forces but they are engineers, mechanics or painters. These are services that are needed within the Defence Forces and these people are well able and fully qualified to do the job they have been doing. It would be no harm for the Department of Defence to look at this and try to take a common-sense approach. Not everybody has to be 18, 19 or 20 going into the Defence Forces. We have people with a profession who could be utilised and take the stress off certain parts of the Department. I look forward to the response in two weeks' time.