Willie O'Dea (Limerick East, Fianna Fail)

I contest those figures. I am told that €500,000 is all that is necessary to immediately spend on the barracks to which the troops are going because there are extensive facilities available in those barracks already. I am taking into account the various allowances, the cost of transportation and that €500,000. We envisage spending another €2.5 million on infrastructure over the next three years and that brings the figure up from €3.2 million to €5.9 million. I cannot understand how anybody can come up with a figure that says closing barracks will cost us more than keeping them open, especially when we have experience in the past of the savings we have got from barrack closures. That makes no sense.

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