Matt Carthy (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Cuirim fáilte rompu go léir. I thank the witnesses for being here and thank Ms Sinnamon for her opening statement.

I hope Ms Sinnamon does not mind me being a little critical but, with due respect, her statement could have been read by the Tánaiste and Minister for Defence or by an official in the Department. It is important that an oversight body provide a broad oversight in terms of where we are vis-à-vis some of the key issues in the Commission on the Defence Forces.

I will deal specifically with the issue of the working time directive because this committee has heard from representative organisations repeatedly that the single biggest thing that Government could do to address the recruitment, but particularly the retention, crisis with the Defence Forces is remove the blanket exclusion of Defence Forces personnel from the protections of the working time directive. It has been identified as a core strategic priority within the Tánaiste's strategic framework for the transformation of the Defence Forces. The Commission on the Defence Forces, in February 2022, recommended the expeditious removal of the blanket exclusion. Five months later, in July 2022, the high-level action plan identified submitting heads of Bill as an early action to be completed within six months. In March 2023, a full year and a bit later, in the update on the high-level action plan, the Tánaiste reported that the legislative framework was well progressed. In November 2023, within his detailed implementation plan, the Tánaiste set a target of last January for the heads of Bill to be progressed and yet, last month, when I submitted a parliamentary question, the Minister for enterprise, whose Department it falls under, refused to give any timeline for the legislation. I have to say I was a little surprised that the working time directive was not mentioned in Ms Sinnamon's remarks. I reiterate that this committee has heard on numerous occasions that this is the single greatest thing the Government could do in terms of addressing the issues.

In terms of budget allocations, Ms Sinnamon mentioned rightly that the defence budget has increased year on year but she did not mention that the Commission on the Defence Forces set out a ten-year capital investment requirement. It set out that it would require, in 2022 figures, annual investment of €246.5 million in additional expenditure every year over ten years. Government has fallen short of that target by €70 million in the past two years and while Ms Sinnamon set out correctly that next year's target of €215 million and the following year's rise to €220 million will be an historic high, it still falls short of what the commission set out was required in order to meet level of ambition 2.

My question to Ms Sinnamon is: has her oversight group a view as to how long, under the current trajectory, it will take for capital expenditure within the Defence Forces to meet the level that was set out within a ten-year timeframe in the Commission on the Defence Force's report? I also was expecting some insight into the reason €18 million that was allocated to the Defence Forces went unspent last year and was surrendered to the Exchequer. This is an annual phenomenon. Largely, it results from the fact that every year on budget day, the Tánaiste announces that he is providing funding for 400 additional personnel and every year, since he and this Government have been in office, more members have left than have joined.

I have a number of specific questions that perhaps the oversight group has a view on. The number of patrol days has decreased dramatically over recent years. Ms Sinnamon referenced the recent acquisitions of naval vessels and maritime patrol aircraft. Based on those acquisitions, has Ms Sinnamon an understanding as to how many ships we are able to simultaneously put to sea and what level of patrol is being and should be carried out with our new capacity? Can Ms Sinnamon give a view as to the timeline that will be in place in order to acquire military radar and sub-sea awareness capabilities - two primary pieces of infrastructure that we have set out?

We have also seen in recent months the outsourcing of particular roles within the Defence Forces. We have seen the outsourcing of naval maintenance and ordnance training and now recruitment itself is outsourced. Has the oversight group opinions on how this relates to the implementation of the recommendations and has it any fear that the outsourcing of these provisions within the Defence Forces leaves less opportunities within the Defence Forces for particular skills?

I welcome that there has been a focus on the Reserve Defence Forces. The recommendations regarding the reserve and the recent document on regeneration, however light on detail, are welcome because we need to have a particular focus. However, I still get the sense that there is a lack of ambition with respect to redeveloping the Reserve Defence Forces knowing, as we do, that across the world reserve defence forces are a critical element of recruitment to the permanent defence forces and we are critically low levels. In terms of the group, has Ms Sinnamon a view as to what the expectation is and should be in respect to the strength of the Reserve Defence Forces, say, over the next two to five years?