Tommy Broughan (Dublin Bay North, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Leas-Cheann Comhairle, who was kind to allow me to come in. The other side of the very poor pay and conditions are the huge gaps in the establishment figure of Defence Forces. The Minister of State told me recently there are only seven crews to man eight ships in the Naval Service. The bomb disposal unit workload has doubled but there are major gaps in that unit. The most serious of all is the Air Corps. A few months ago, the Minister of State told me there were 132 vacancies in the establishment figure. We saw the serious impact of this in March 2017, in the tragedy off the Mayo coast when an Air Corps plane was not able to be brought into use.

Clearly, there are major gaps across the Defence Forces. I voted against PESCO. I believe that a strongly neutral country should have an effective defence force that is well paid, well looked after and available to serve the nation. I ask the Minister of State to address the serious gaps in the current force.

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