Willie Penrose (Longford-Westmeath, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I and the representative association accept the point that extending the age limit for service depends upon personnel satisfying the health and fitness criteria. That is a sine qua non. Those are exacting standards and everybody accepts that.

In this era of cost-effectiveness and value for money, I will illustrate to the Minister of State how important is the proposal I have made in the following example. A number of privates and corporals who will be compulsorily discharged after 21 years are technicians who have undergone a four-year technician scheme. Typically, such individuals may have completed ten years' service before becoming fully trained in their trade or occupation. I estimate that the four-year training period costs €200,000 and the State may get only a further 11 years' service from them as fully-trained technicians before they are discharged. By extending the period, the State would get another nine or ten years' service from them. It would increase the level of efficiency.

There are a number of issues I want to raise. What will be the cost to the Exchequer in additional pension and gratuity following the compulsory discharge of 1994 entrants after 21 years? I have given the Minister of State an idea of it. What would be the additional cost to the Exchequer to train and replace the general service personnel being compulsorily discharged after 21 years? Those are issues. The Minister of State will not have the answers to them today and I do not expect them, but I raise them in the context of the conciliation and arbitration procedure. Those are matters the Minister's side should be raising. I am making the case for the Minister as well as the personnel concerned. I have close contacts with the Army. I am one of the few who gave up a senior position because I have such a strong belief and association with the personnel in the Army, especially given how important the barracks was to Mullingar.

What will be the additional cost to the Exchequer to train and replace the technician-class personnel being compulsorily discharged after 21 years? What arrangement is being put in place to deliver on the commitments given in 1994 to train and upskill those personnel being compulsorily discharged? If the personnel being compulsorily discharged after 21 years are legally entitled to redundancy payments, what is the position there? Assuming the personnel who are being compulsorily discharged after 21 years continue to meet health, fitness and efficiency standards laid down for their ranks, why let them go? Does the Minister of State believe that those being compulsorily discharged after 21 years will end up being unemployed and will incur an additional cost to the Exchequer through jobseeker's benefit or whatever?

It is rarely I come in with such a strong case. This case is so strong that the Department should be going before the conciliation and arbitration body hoping that the adjudicator makes the right decision. It would be good for the Army and the Department of Defence and for the personnel involved. It would save money. From sitting around the Cabinet table along with the Minister of State, Deputy Kehoe, for a while, I am aware that such was the key, while still ensuring that we have the necessary personnel with the appropriate standards to meet the demanding obligations that the Minister of State correctly outlined in the reply.

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