Aengus Ó Snodaigh (Dublin South Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

When the Chief of Staff, Vice Admiral Mark Mellett, appeared before the joint committee last week, he tried to explain the loss of sea days by saying boardings were made more efficiently and so forth. That may well be the case, but it does not explain the fact that in 2005 there were 1,681 patrol days, while the Minister of State is now talking about a figure of 1,000. That does not compute. As we now have more ships than we had in 2005, there is something wrong. The Minister of State should admit that there is a major problem with retention in the Naval Service and that he cannot get ships out to sea to carry out full operations as it did in the past.

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