Sir, - There must be many members and former members of the Defence Forces who, like me, view the current spate of Army deafness claims with outrage.
There never was a tradition of deafness in the Army. As a private soldier I served under non-commissioned officers who, in other armies, had experienced combat of the most intense nature. None of them ever complained of nor showed signs of deafness. If progressive deafness is a strong possibility in the Army, it must surely have been woven into the military folklore, but the fact is that deafness was never mentioned for the good reason that no-one experienced it.
A reasonable man or woman must be aware of the impossibility that, from a given day, a huge number of people in and out of the Defence Forces could suddenly and simultaneously suffer a deterioration in their hearing.
To put it another way, if all the claimants were arraigned as one plaintiff before a court and that common body (the plaintiff) pleaded a sudden and simultaneous affliction for which there had been no previous evidence, their case would be summarily thrown out of court on the grounds of implausibility alone.
Judgement of a degree of deafness must be a complicated one, dependent on many factors. It appears to be somewhat akin to the classic pain in the back which can neither be proven nor disproven. Relative to this, it may be that the conduct of modern life (traffic, discos, ghetto-blasters and so on) has contributed to a deterioration in the common standard of hearing. It should not be beyond the capability of the Army Medical Corps to draw up standards which would accommodate the new conditions, rather than treating each case as related to military-service.
It is incontestable that there are and were regulations in the Army regarding the use of ear defenders. If there was negligence in their use, the solution was to take disciplinary action against the officers supervising the firing practices rather than be stampeded into a mad rush to the courts.
And then there are the claims from the more senior people. Surely, as supervising officers, this again should be the subject of disciplinary action in that the people concerned failed to comply with the regulations which it was their duty to uphold. Senior people are put there to enforce the law and not to be rewarded for breaking it.
Duty and honour do mean something. Failure on the part of individuals to accept these concepts has in recent years accelerated the demise of many great institutions both at home and abroad.
While many in the country are benefiting from our increased prosperity there are many potential demands on the public purse - the opening of the new Tallaght Hospital, emphasis (hopefully) on education for those deprived of it for generations and improvement in the standards of the marginalised, to name but a few.
Those in authority whose duty it is to represent the public interest will be vilified if they fail to find a solution to the Army deafness claims. It is not an overly complicated problem: all that is needed is that leaders do what they are put there to do: lead. - Yours, etc.,
Avondale Lawn, Blackrock, Co Dublin.