The Curragh Camp is a military training facility and the decision was made many years ago by a previous Government that having married quarters with families on a military training facility was not appropriate. That is not to say that there are not individuals, some of whom are in vulnerable circumstances, still accommodated there. We are trying to deal with that situation and are speaking to Kildare County Council about their needs. That conversation is still open. Thirty-eight married quarter houses are occupied …

If the Deputy has evidence of soldiers sleeping in cars, I would like to hear it. I have heard that accusation before and it has never been followed up with me in terms of details.

If she has those details, I would like to speak to the individuals concerned and we will try to work with them. I have visited the Curragh and will continue to do so regularly, but the Deputies may wish to note that the following major capital projects are planned in the coming years at a combined cost of €32.7 million: the cadet school, which is scheduled to commence this year; engineering stores, scheduled to commence this year; communications and information services, CIS, workshops, scheduled to commence next y…

Ireland is continuing to provide strong political and practical support for Ukraine as we continue to assert Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity. The Government has stated that Ireland will play its part in assisting people from Ukraine and has lifted visa requirements to allow people from there who want to seek safety in Ireland to do so as easily as possible. The European Union has agreed a package of €500 million in military assistance for Ukraine. While Ireland has constructively abstained on the le…

This is a war-time situation and we need to get into that mindset to make the kind of contribution that Ireland wants to make to these efforts. So far, considerably more than 2 million people have come across the border from Ukraine into the EU, primarily into Poland, but also into Hungary, Slovakia and Romania, all of which border Ukraine. Of course, Moldova is under major pressure as well. That number is likely to continue increasing. If this war continues, we could see somewhere between 4 million and 6 million r…

For me, it was very reassuring to see the Minister for Social Protection, Deputy Humphreys, and the Minister for Justice, Deputy McEntee, at Dublin Airport yesterday meeting refugees as they arrived into Ireland. Instead of being asked to fill out forms and show their visas and passports, they were being given toys, mobile phone chargers and SIM cards. This is the message that Ireland wants to send, namely, that we are acting, preparing and resourcing in solidarity with a country that is being torn apart by brutali…

I propose to take Questions Nos. 8, 11, 39, 41, 53 and 59 together. The Commission on the Defence Forces was established on foot of a commitment in the programme for Government and a Government decision in December 2020, which also agreed its terms of reference and membership. The report was published on 9 February last. The commission undertook a significant body of work encompassing its wide-ranging terms of reference. The report contains 69 main recommendations and, together with subrecommendations, there are 13…

There are a lot of questions there and I will try to get through them as quickly as I can. Deputy O'Dowd asked about the security of the State, the security of Europe, and Ireland's commitment to it. These are all very important questions Neutrality does not mean we stay out of these debates. Deputy Brady has just said that neutrality means against all countries and against their militaries, equating the UK, the US, and Russia as if they were all in the same space. That is not neutrality to me, just to be clear.

Neutrality and military non-alignment to me mean that Ireland decides when and where we intervene, who we partner with, and what side we take on debates and in conflicts and so on. We decide and we are not tied into those positions by alliances we have signed up to. That is what non-alignment and military neutrality is for me. On the Russian invasion of Ukraine, we are not neutral. We have made it very clear we are taking sides here, from a humanitarian point of view and from a military support point of view, to al…

I hope the Acting Chair will give me a little extra time given the number of Deputies in this grouping. The scepticism around whether this report will be implemented in full is fair. Even though there is a significant body of work on this and most people I have spoken to accept it is necessary to implement these recommendations now, there is understandable scepticism because this would mean a complete change in the setting of the resource base for defence, that is, where we start from. Effectively, the report is re…

The principle of competitive tendering for Government contracts is used by the Department of Defence for the acquisition of defensive equipment for the Defence Forces. This is an EU law requirement in accordance with the defence and security directive. Central to those procedures is the requirement to allow fair competition between suppliers through the submission of tenders following advertising of the tender competition on the eTenders site and on the Official Journal of the European Union, where appropriate. Suc…

They are not armaments companies.

It is not arms though, to be clear.

As the Deputy knows, Ireland does not decide on arms embargoes. The trade policy of the European Union is decided collectively. It is proposed by the Commission and debated by member states. We had a very good debate on the Amnesty International report in this House last week. There was also a debate on it in the Seanad. It highlights many very important issues that Ireland continues to bring to light and focus on. Ireland is the most vocal country in the European Union with regard to the treatment of Palestinians …

Ireland has not made any proposal to place an arms embargo on Israel. What we are doing and will continue to do is speak to both the Israeli and Palestinian sides to try to advance a peace process that is desperately needed. We have continued to do that and we have called out illegality when it has taken place. I have been clear, and at times, quite forceful, in my criticism of the Israeli Government’s policy towards Palestinians and I have invested a lot of time, on behalf of this House and the Irish people, into …

The Glen of Imaal is the primary field firing and tactical training asset for the Defence Forces. These lands are the main training and largest live firing range areas at their disposal. This training area has been in continuous use for over a century and remains so to this day. The facility consists of lands in the Glen of Imaal, including the air firing range and the Coolmoney Camp. The training area is in constant use for troop exercises such as overseas readiness, casualty evacuation and air firing involving bo…

It might be helpful to give the House a sense of the scale there. The entire training lands contain some 6,700 acres and it is the biggest land holding in the defence portfolio. The Glen of Imaal is the primary training land bank in the country. We have other significant land banks and training centres but nothing as big as the Glen of Imaal. There may have been some suggestions that we could use part of that land bank and facility for housing accommodation.

That is probably not appropriate, it is remote and the dormitory-style facilities at the camp are not appropriate for families as they have collective shower facilities and so on. That is not an option but it is an important part of our defence land bank infrastructure.

I know people link the radar capacity with Russian naval military manoeuvres but we knew all about those manoeuvres. The Russians informed us and looked for permission. They informed the Irish Aviation Authority, which is what happens when a military wants to engage in manoeuvres in international waters that we are responsible for. That is not to say there is not an issue with primary radar; there is. The equipment development plan for the Defence Forces was published in June 2020 and was completed following extens…

The issue of primary radar has been under discussion since 2015. When I was last in this portfolio and when Deputy Kehoe was Minister for Defence we were both involved in that discussion. Plans have been put in place but it is primarily a resourcing issue. We have a lot of capacity gaps such as long-range strategic lift capacity and the need to invest more in cyber protection and primary radar. There are a range of other capacity resource issues. That is what the commission was put in place to address. We have reco…