Thomas Byrne (Meath East, Fianna Fail)

It is up to the Senator to accept this or not but my point is that this is coming from member states. If the committee does video calls or visits other member states and the other member states get to choose the agenda, for most member states, particularly in eastern and southern Europe, this will be the number one item on that agenda. I called to my friend and colleague, the former Europe minister in Finland, who is from the Social Democratic Party, which has a Labour Party sister party group there. She is the leader in opposition and her first question to me was what was Ireland doing on defence. This is not the usual suspects; this is not people looking for a European army. This is people who are concerned about protecting their own country and they are wondering what other countries are doing as well. They would like to know what is happening around Ireland as well. They would like to know what is happening with subsea cables because they facilitate a lot of commerce across the Atlantic. It is not about a European army, European defence or scare stories.