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Displaying items by tag: Automatic Citizenship

PDFORRA the representative group of the Defence Forces, has called for automatic citizenship to be given to non-nationals who have completed five years' service in the Army, the Naval Service or the Air Corps and who have attained a conduct rating of good during that time.

Gerard Guinan, General Secretary of PDFORRA (Permanent Defence Force Other Rank) said non-nationals who were serving the State were having to spend thousands of euro in a protracted process to become Irish citizens.

According to figures supplied to PDFORRA by the Defence Forces, more than 200 non-nationals have successfully applied to become members of the Army, the Naval Service and the Air Corps over the past five years.

Membership of the Defence Forces is open to people who are not Irish citizens, but who are from other EU member states, along with Britain, Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway.

Membership is also open to people who have been granted refugee status in Ireland.

More from RTE News here. 

Published in Navy

The Dragon was designed by Johan Anker in 1929 as an entry for a competition run by the Royal Yacht Club of Gothenburg, to find a small keel-boat that could be used for simple weekend cruising among the islands and fjords of the Scandinavian seaboard. The original design had two berths and was ideally suited for cruising in his home waters of Norway. The boat quickly attracted owners and within ten years it had spread all over Europe.

The Dragon's long keel and elegant metre-boat lines remain unchanged, but today Dragons are constructed using the latest technology to make the boat durable and easy to maintain. GRP is the most popular material, but both new and old wooden boats regularly win major competitions while looking as beautiful as any craft afloat. Exotic materials are banned throughout the boat, and strict rules are applied to all areas of construction to avoid sacrificing value for a fractional increase in speed.

The key to the Dragon's enduring appeal lies in the careful development of its rig. Its well-balanced sail plan makes boat handling easy for lightweights, while a controlled process of development has produced one of the most flexible and controllable rigs of any racing boat.