Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputy for that interesting vignette of history of the success of rural development which Fr. Harry Bohan was a pioneer of. We need more partnerships like that. We are investing in a lot of accommodation in existing barracks and in Haulbowline, where significant refurbishment has already taken place. We want to increase the specification and quality of this accommodation. It is primarily being used by those who are training for prolonged periods, for six-month training periods and so forth. There is a construction programme under way in respect of that nature of accommodation. I am not inclined to dispose of any more barracks where we have personnel because there is a link between where we have Army barracks and recruitment. One of the downsides of closing or transforming barracks has been a loss of military tradition within those communities. If you meet any of the groups going off to the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon, UNIFIL, and so on, invariably when you ask them where they are from you find that there has been a military tradition in that town or location. We have to keep that in mind in terms of recruitment and retention into the future. However I take the Deputy's point on accommodation.

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