Willie O'Dea (Limerick East, Fianna Fail)

It is something in that order, yes. We will communicate the figure to the Deputy.

We are awaiting recommendations from the military authorities on how best to deal with the first line Reserve. Those recommendations have not come to hand as yet.

Regarding the integrated Reserve and the initial results in terms of getting a particular group of the Reserve to integrate to allow them step in with the PDF in the event of a contingency, the pilot phase has been disappointing in terms of the numbers it has yielded but nevertheless it has resulted in approximately 300 people being trained to integrate in the circumstances outlined in the White Paper. We have learned lessons from the pilot project, however, and are examining the type of training and systems being put in place to advance the integrated Reserve experiment. As soon as the position has been reviewed we will return to the integrated Reserve issue.

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