Dr. Mark Mellett:

I think I made the point clearly that I want to see more women in the Defence Forces. I am disappointed we do not have more women at senior rank in all three services.

The promotion system is part of a conciliation and arbitration outcome between representation, military management and the Department. The critical point, I would say, is that right now in the operational headquarters of Operation Sophia in the Mediterranean, there is a female lieutenant commander, one of the naval officers, who previously commanded a number of ships. In my time in the navy, a quarter of our ships were commanded by female captains.

I have read and contributed to research endeavouring to address the issue of gender inequality within the Naval Service, in particular, and I have seen some of the findings and they give me cause for reflection. I have doubled my efforts on trying to take out some of the impediments to development within the Defence Forces. One of them is modularisation of our long career courses. The command and staff course is about nine months long and I have tried to break that into modules to make it more family friendly. That will particularly apply to women members of the Defence Forces, but it is obviously open to male members.

I think there are challenges in terms of nurturing within the Defence Forces and the separation that goes with parenting, particular for women members. Areas such as breastfeeding and young childcare are a challenge to us and I would love to see more initiatives like a crèche. I have tried to drive that on a number of occasions and have come up against impediments in trying to establish a crèche within the Defence Forces.

With regard to normalisation, where we have two serving family members, I want to introduce a means whereby certain freedoms are brought in. If members serves overseas, they will have periods of exemption from duties to encourage them and make it easier for them to serve overseas without being penalised with regards to routine domestically when they come home.

I would love to see female chief petty officers and warrant officers in the naval service. It is not a question of a glass ceiling. It is critical for equality, as I said earlier, that we have that decision making input at the more senior ranks, in the non-commissioned ranks as well as senior officers within the Naval Service.

To reassure Deputy Clare Daly, I will continue to give leadership to have equal opportunities for women within the Defence Forces.

Regarding people being forced out of the Defence Forces, I take any issues regarding administrative instruction A7 very seriously. That is a provision relating to harassment within the Defence Forces. I continually monitor that, as well as any evidence of bullying and harassment within the Defence Forces. There are regular briefings on that and there is an openness. I mentioned the issue of town halls earlier, when Deputy Clare Daly was not here, at which I try and push the importance of institutionalising a gender perspective, the appointment of a gender adviser, the appointment of gender focal points and the creation of a woman's forum in the various units to try and ensure moving on that path towards a gender perspective being institutionalised. Gender inequality is not just an issue for women, it is an issue for men. In an organisation that is predominantly male, I want to address that.