Defence Forces
Dail Éireann — 2026-02-17
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Helen McEntee (FG), Meath East

The new strategic infrastructure plan and the new strategic framework clearly set out how we can be more ambitious when it comes to increasing our overall Defence Forces numbers. Our numbers increased by 200 last year. I appreciate that this is a smaller number than we would like, but I am determined that we will continue on that trajectory right across our Defence Forces. To that effect, I am working closely with the Defence Forces to make sure we have a new workforce plan in place, but also that we have a new civilianisation plan, which I will have by the summer. It is important that we have both of these because if we want to increase our Defence Forces numbers to the level that we want to get to, it is not just about increasing the number of our Defence Forces personnel in the way we have before. We need to look at greater civilianisation and greater ways in which people can come into the Defence Forces having come from the private sector bringing different types of experience, particularly at a time when the types of threats that are changing require us to focus more on cybersecurity and cyber threats. We have to make sure we have that level of expertise where we have not perhaps seen it in the past. There are a lot of different strands of work under way to help us get to that overall target and to help us achieve those increased numbers. We have already started to see progress happen because a lot of work has been done, but I want to make sure that we can drive that progress and get to those levels as quickly as possible.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-02-17/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:38+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-02-17