Alan Shatter (Dublin South, Fine Gael)

To address the question Deputy Calleary has raised, if one looks at what I describe as the role of the medical officer in the Defence Forces first, basically, it is a specialist officer who practises medicine, not only at home but abroad. One of the attractions of joining the Defence Forces as a medic is the opportunity to accompany forces abroad in circumstances that would be quite different from providing a medical practice at home - there is one medic in the Lebanon at present.

The medical practice focuses on health protection, education, primary care and environmental medicine. In addition to their medical role, medical officers are expected to lead and manage the personnel of the medical corps.

One must realise that, for example, if on a mission abroad a member of the Defence Forces took seriously ill and required medical surgery, the doctor accompanying the medical corps who was abroad with them would not be the person usually to undertake that type of surgery. There are medical personnel from states with far greater numbers in their defence forces and who within their defence forces retain the specialties required in different surgical areas to provide that type of expertise. The Defence Forces are small and funding is limited. A general practitioner joining the Defence Forces is unlikely to advance in a medical career. Such a person may be promoted by the Army but is unlikely to advance beyond being a general medical practitioner who has developed some specialised knowledge in the area of medical problems arising in an army or naval context. There is a limit to what one can achieve as a medical practitioner within the Defence Forces. I will use this opportunity to say that the Defence Forces provide a singular opportunity for young, well-qualified medics to experience a very interesting engagement for a period of their lives in a form of public service that gives rise to opportunities they would not normally have. I am very hopeful that in the current financial climate the new advertising campaign might attract more applications than was the case previously.

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