Brian Stanley (Laois, Sinn Fein)
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91. To ask the Taoiseach and Minister for Defence his plans to address the issues of staff retention in the regular Defence Forces. [40187/18]

Paul Kehoe (Wexford, Fine Gael)
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The nature of military service requires that the age and health profile of personnel in the Defence Forces must be appropriately managed to ensure that capability requirements are met. In this context, the Defence Forces have a higher level of turnover than other areas of the public service and this is a feature of military organisations internationally. The overall numbers departing the Permanent Defence Force in recent years are broadly consistent with the long term trend, with some exceptions.

Rates of pay and conditions of employment in the Irish public service have traditionally been set by, amongst other things, reference to levels of pay across the various sectors of the Irish public service. Defence Forces pay is increasing in accordance with public sector pay agreements. The focus of these increases is weighted in favour of those on lower pay. Following on from previous pay increases, the Public Service Stability Agreement 2018-2020 provides for increases in pay ranging from 6.2% to 7.4% over the lifetime of the Agreement with the focus of the agreement once again being on the lower paid. A 1% increase in annualised salaries due from 1 January 2018 has been paid and a further 1% was due on 1st October 2018. New entrants to the Defence Forces will also benefit from the measures which were recently announced in relation to amendments to the pay scales for new entrant public servants recruited since January 2011

In 2017, under my direction, the Department of Defence raised certain recruitment and retention issues as part of the submission to the Public Service Pay Commission. In a further acknowledgement of these issues the Government tasked the Public Service Pay Commission with examining these challenges in the Defence Sector in more detail. The Public Service Pay Commission has commenced this work.

The Permanent Defence Force continues to offer excellent career opportunities for serving personnel and for new entrants. Ensuring that the terms and conditions of serving members of the Permanent Defence Force are fair and balanced, is also a key consideration. There are a range of actions outlined in the White Paper on Defence (2015) which are aimed at advancing this goal and, in this context, there is an ongoing programme of HR development within the Defence Organisation.

The measures I have set out address a range of factors and are aimed at ensuring that the Defence Forces retain the capabilities to undertake the roles assigned by Government and remains a valued career choice.