Naval Service sees rise in recruitment for 2025

Naval Service patrol vessel 'Fionnghuala', which same into service earlier this year.  Picture: Valerie O'Sullivan

The strength of the Naval Service now stands at 784, up from 719 at the end of last year, official figures show.

A total of 156 recruits have been inducted into the Naval Service up to October this year, 59 more than the total number of inductions in 2024, which stood at 97.

It continues a steady improvement in recruitment, from a low base of 68 recruits in 2023, and just 28 in 2022.

The current strength is still well short of its establishment figure (what it should have) of 1,094. 

It is not clear how the Naval Service will get near the target set by Level of Ambition (LOA) 2 in the Commission on the Defence Forces report of February 2022.

LOA 2, which was adopted by the government, sets out a new Naval Service establishment figure of 1,794 by 2028 — meaning 1,000 additional personnel between 2026 and 2028 or over 330 on average per year.

This would be net of inductions minus discharges from the service, requiring recruitment to be well in excess of 1,000.

Last year was the first year when recruitment exceeded discharges for many years, with 97 recruits compared to 75 discharges.

It is not clear how many sailors will leave the Naval Service in total this year; by the end of August there had been 33 discharges.

Defence minister Helen McEntee told the Dáil the doubling of the Naval Service patrol duty allowance and the extension of the Naval Service tax credit had assisted in retention and recruitment as well as increases in pay.

She said the number of applications to join the service had increased by 30% to October 31 this year to 2,591, compared to applications for all of last year.

Sinn Féin Cork South Central TD Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire highlighted problems with retaining and recruiting specialist staff, such as marine engineer officers. He gave the example of the 63rd Naval Service class where six cadets commenced training, but only two were commissioned. The four people who withdrew cited the extended service commitments as the primary reason.

“Specialist numbers within the Naval Service are critically low despite targeted recruitment,” he said, adding that marine engineers were operating at half-strength.

He said that the Representative Association of Commissioned Officers (Raco) had recommended a service commitment scheme for critical roles.

Ms McEntee, also foreign affairs minister, said there had been 19 direct entry inductions into specialist roles this year.

Naval Service patrol days have more than halved in five years: 1,061 days in 2019; 790 in 2022; 520 in 2023, and 428 days in 2024.

The trend looks set to end this year, with 349 patrol days up to the end of August.

The Defence Forces have been reportedly finishing a Naval Service Regeneration Plan for the consideration of the minister for a while now. It is due to set out courses of action to increase the number of ships at sea.

The department states the NS has a fleet of eight vessels, four of them “available for operations”. LOA 2 envisages a fleet of nine operational ships by 2030.