Taoiseach Leo Varadkar has said the issue of recruiting women to the Defence Forces was a “core” problem in staffing.
The government is hoping to increase Defence Force staff to 10,500 members.
There are more than 7,000 men in the Defence Forces, according to Varadkar.
“If we had half the number of women as we have men at the moment, we’d be exceeding that target”, Varadkar said.
So far this year, just one woman has been inducted into the Defence Forces out of 617 female applicants in 2023 up to 31 May.
A further six women have been inducted this year from applications made last year.
The Department of Defence released this information in response to a parliamentary question from Clare TD Violet Anne Wynne.
Wynne served as a member of the reserve Defence Forces for three years.
It comes just days after figures showed that the number of personell leaving the Defence Forces was double the number of new recruits.
In 2022, 891 people were discharged from he Army, Air Corps and Naval Service compared to just 435 inductions.
The figures were released to Green Party TD Patrick Costello.
Source: BUZZ
