THE number of voluntary early retirements from the Defence Forces should be increased, said the Fianna Fail spokesman on defence, Mr Michael Smith.

The retirement scheme introduced by the Minister for Defence was "in a shambles", he said at question time.more redundancies rather than keep disgruntled people in the forces.

The Minister, Mr Barrett, said that a total of 1,119 personnel made applications under the scheme, which was more than expected. A number of offers had been made and would continue to be made over the coming weeks. This year's budget provided Pounds 13 million to fund the first phase of the scheme, under which about 450 personnel would be released.

The aim was to allow for the release of up to 2,300 over a three year period. Apart from budgetary considerations it would not be desirable or practical from an organisational point of view to allow the release of the total number in the first year. The aim was to move to a total strength of 11,500 in the permanent Defence Forces.