National Security
Dail Éireann — 2025-12-10
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Micheál Martin (FF), Cork South-Central

Through the Chair, we need to acknowledge that and the very effective work of An Garda Síochána and our Defence Forces. There is a lot of noise which suits other interests to portray Ireland in a certain light. The Deputy should be wary of that, too.
Deputy Lawless raised the issue of cybersecurity. Cyber threats and attacks have increased significantly since the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Some have been by criminal elements, some have been by professionals. There are also third party state actors in respect of cybersecurity threats. It is a very serious issue for both public utilities and private sector companies. It is costing a lot of funding to deal with that. We have brought the National Cyber Security Centre under the Department of justice. It is a very strong centre and has grown in capacity very significantly in the past five years. I remember when we started it. It has developed a really strong capacity under Richard Browne. Credit needs to be given in respect of that.
I make the point to Deputy Ó Murchú that there is not a failure in funding, frankly, and finance will not be an issue here. What is an issue is the procurement timelines, both within the European defence industry and more generally. We are working to see if we can accelerate procurement. We are doing that with the radar. That is why we took a joint country approach to procurement - to fast track it. In other words, we use the experience and expertise of countries that have experience of procuring the radar we are now seeking. Everyone will be about how fast we can procure. It will also be about taking an intelligent approach in terms of what we procure. The nature of modern warfare or security threats has changed radically. We are all witnessing the drone technology change, as well as the cybersecurity. What can we do undersea? How do we protect cables? How do we protect gas connectors? It is a whole-of-society security approach that is required here. It is not the traditional, conventional approach to defence and security. We need to consider and explore that point more, perhaps.
On the Dublin-Monaghan bombing, Deputy Boyd-Barrett is correct insofar as the summary of the Denton report was produced yesterday. It is regrettable that we do not have the full Denton report. I think there was some legal action taken to try to prevent it being published in full. The Kenova report has been published. We should have a debate on the Kenova report in this House in the new year. It reveals very sordid activity by state actors but also by paramilitaries, including the Provisional IRA. The Kenova report does not pull its punches in saying it was a threat to its own community or attacked its own community. What went on is quite unbelievable.
The Denton report stated that 120 people were murdered by a network of loyalist paramilitaries and RUC and UDR personnel, including those killed in the Dublin-Monaghan bombings. It is a very sordid story and both the Kenova and Denton reports cover it. I pay tribute to Jon Boutcher, who is now the head of the PSNI, for his leadership on Kenova, and also to Iain Livingstone. They withstood a lot of pressure. We will have two comprehensive reports, if we can get the latter one published.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2025-12-10/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:27+00:00
Sitting date: 2025-12-10