Army deafness claims could still cost an estimated £150 million, despite this week's High Court judgment accepting the State's official guidelines on hearing damage, the Dail was told.
The Minister for Defence, Mr Smith, said estimates of £5.5 billion were always wrong and absurd, but before the court decision they were talking about a doomsday situation with costs exceeding £1 billion.
"We are now talking about figures which certainly can be reduced very substantially from there, probably somewhere in the region of £150 million," the Minister added. "There are claims coming in and a significant sum has to be raised."
Mr Smith revealed that the number of weekly claims had almost halved to 79 from a peak of 135 last January. There were 11,112 claims outstanding.
He said he was heartened by the High Court decision, adding that for some time the courts had been handicapped by the absence of an agreed basis for assessing hearing loss. Therefore, the court's acceptance, of the "green book" as a fair and reasonable system of measurement of hearing disability represented a very important landmark, he added.
"While I accept that this case is only one of many listed for hearing before the courts, it does appear that a basis for removing Army hearing loss cases from the courts system now appears to be emerging," he added.
The Fine Gael spokeswoman on defence, Ms Frances Fitzgerald, said deputies on all sides of the House would welcome the fact that the "green book" had been accepted by the courts. She asked the Minister what his timetable was for setting up a compensation tribunal, an Army pensions board and a State claims agency - three important elements in tackling the problem which went back 30 to 40 years.
Mr Smith said if the court judgment was to form the basis for future judgments, which he hoped it would, they would be facing millions of pounds and not billions. "That is an enormous relief to all of us, should that work out."
He had said he had been happy to establish an alternative mechanism from the very beginning, once the quantum was down to realistic and affordable levels. Should the test case become the norm, he would proceed immediately to ensure that an alternative mechanism was available.
Mr Smith said he did not want to set out a timespan because there were issues which had to be clarified. "But most certainly the alternative mechanisms will be in place for the autumn sessions."
Mr Billy Timmins (FG, Wicklow) said it looked as if they had pulled back slightly from the doomsday scenario they had been facing. But the claims were still going to cost money. He asked the Minister if there were any plans to sell Department of Defence real estate which was no longer required.
Mr Smith said that given a choice between sale to advantage in the current climate and equipping the Defence Forces, he would immediately go for the former.
The Minister also revealed that of the 596 personnel enlisted into the FCA from January to midApril, 118 had failed the medical examination on hearing grounds.
"It is possible that a number of applicants who failed the hearing test may have failed because their hearing temporarily did not meet the required standard, for example, a heavy cold, and may pass the test on further testing," he added.
