Mr. Eugene Gargan:

Senator Craughwell asked about the establishment of a Reserve cyber group. Having worked in cybersecurity and telecoms for a number of years before I moved career last year, I have an insight into this area. The first important point I will briefly make, without meaning to be glib, is that if the military authorities, the Department and the State cannot organise the Reserve as it is established, they stand no hope of effectively creating a specialist reserve. All of the challenges that would be faced in establishing something like that will be even more difficult to address than the current challenges. Issues we have been advocating on for a long time, such as employment protection legislation or strategic purpose, have not been addressed. I mentioned earlier the challenges in respect of the organisation of working time. How do you go about fixing that? If that cannot be fixed for the likes of us, how would it be managed when engaging with industry? The Senator asked about engagement with industry. That would be a great idea. It is something we did ourselves as a representative association a number of years ago. We spoke to both of the employer bodies and were very well received because they could see the value of having people who were motivated, trained, fit and subject to random drug testing, who understood discipline, who generally understood authority, could get on and, for the most part, possessed some degree of leadership skills, who you could trust and who had a fair degree of common sense. We would absolutely advocate for that. Perhaps Mr. Cooney will further address the question of establishing a Reserve cybersecurity group.