The emergence this week of details of a pay claim put in by the Defence Forces top brass could scarcely have come at a worse time. It coincided with a report in this newspaper that the Naval Service was unable to provide a vessel to take part in a search off the coast of Cork for a ship believed to be involved in a drug smuggling operation.
The LÉ George Bernard Shaw – the only vessel in the six-ship fleet that is currently active – had been dispatched to Dún Laoghaire to take part in the St Patrick’s festival. It remained there despite a request for assistance from the gardaí to take part in the search.
There is a danger of overly conflating the two issues, not least because the request to match the salaries of senior military officers to equivalent ranks in the Garda or Civil Service is almost two years old.
In addition, the Defence Forces high command is not directly responsible for the issues of pay and working conditions which are at the heart of the endemic problem with recruitment and retention, which in turn restrict the ability of the Naval Service to crew its ships. That said, they do have responsibility for operational matters including the tasking of vessels to take part in public events.
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Ultimately the senior officers’ pay demand, and the unavailability of the LÉ George Bernard Shaw are two sides of the same coin; the Defence Forces’ inability to offer attractive and well-remunerated careers.
The Government is committed to increasing spending on defence by 50 per cent by 2028 as set out in the implementation plan for the report of the Commission on the Defence Forces.
Recent increases in pay and allowances, including a rise in the patrol duty allowance for sailors, represent a step in the right direction as does the extension of private medical care to all ranks. Other initiatives in relation to pay, such as reflecting the EU working time directive, will take longer to implement. The danger now appears to be that the Defence Forces could run out of generals before that happens.