An army boss has slammed plans to have soldiers working at Dublin Airport saying the deployment could have a major knock-on effect on the rest of the troops.
Army personnel will be drafted to help at the security gates following major delays at the airport that resulted in over 1,400 people missing their flights. President of Defence Forces Representative Mark Keane has demanded clarity on the plans to deploy soldiers at the busy airport.
He said: "We need to know when they’ll be deployed, what roles they’ll be deployed to, how many will be deployed, what will be the nature of the deployment as in what will they do? At the moment we’re hearing that we will not be dealing with the public.
Read more: Soldiers hit back at being asked to 'compensate' for queues at Dublin Airport
"Also the health and safety implications, the implications under the Working Time Directive. Do we still have to undertake our own duties and roles?
"We’re short a great deal of people in the Defence Forces. To take another 100-150 people out of that for a small pool of people, that’s more workload on the people who are left behind in the barracks who maintain operational readiness."
Foreign Affairs and Defence Minister Simon Coveney said the support will last for no longer than six weeks and will be stood down in August when the busy holiday period has passed. But Mr Keane hit back saying this could be extended due to the "fluid nature" of the situation.
He told RTE's Morning Ireland: "Six weeks brings us into the peak season. We have people incumbent on holidays in August again. The tourist season extends into September. Does it last that long?
"What happens with our members who have their own holiday plans, have their own plans to spend time with their families? We have troops ready to deploy overseas, we have troops coming back from overseas.
"What happens to all these things? It’s a domino effect. If you take one thing out it affects everything else."
But despite this, Mr Keane said the troops are ready to "step up to the plate". He said: "We wear a uniform, we’re subjected to military law, we will step up to the plate as we always have done in the past and will continue to do so."
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