Mr. Derek Ryan:

I thank the Deputies for their comments and I thank the Chairman for inviting us here this morning. Its an immensely proud day for ONE and for me, as an ex-serviceman, to come here to advocate on behalf of less well-off servicemen from both the Permanent Defence Force and the Reserve Defence Force.

As the committee will know, we are not a militaristic State but we have contributed hugely and punched above our weight in terms of the United Nations, the EU and everything else that we have contributed troops to over the years. Public awareness in this country is lacking or is not as robust as in other countries - including our nearest neighbour - where people take immense pride in the service of those who have gone before them.

My role on the board of directors of the Organisation of National Ex-Service Personnel, ONE, especially for 2016 as well as in previous years, has been to raise our profile through the fuchsia appeal. I am delighted to hear Deputy Pádraig Mac Lochlainn has bought into the idea and agrees that the appeal is relevant and unique to Ireland.

There are 100,000 ex-service personnel, from both the Reserve and Permanent Defence Force, and their families living in the State. That is a huge number of people who have given service. We have many former garrison towns in which the military served in past decades and more recently. There is a network and we are trying to tap into it. One way for us to raise our profile and ability to fundraise is by getting cross-party support from Deputies, Senators and councillors to wear the fuchsia for the month of July. They could also try to get national and private broadcasters to buy into the concept that service to the State came at a high price which is still being paid by service personnel who have various issues. It behoves us, as an organisation, along the Irish UN Veterans Association, IUNVA, and the State to try to look after the people concerned.

Mr. O'Connor mentioned a veterans' affairs policy which we drafted in conjunction with the IUNVA and the Association of Retired Commissioned Officers, ARCO. The policy sets out, for the first time, a blueprint for how the State can interact with veterans, primarily with ONE and the IUNVA, and then the ARCO. It sets out what the State can provide and how it should provide it. In a utopian world the State would supply everything, but we know that is not possible. In fairness to the State, the recently retired Chief of Staff, the Defence Forces, the Department and the various agencies involved, they have started to interact at a local level with veterans who are preparing to leave the Defence Forces. I am speaking primarily about those who may have medical issues. If they are in the care of consultants or similar, the care will continue after they leave the Defence Forces. The side gates of barracks, in effect, are left open in order that when these personnel finish their military service, their medical files will be kept by the Defence Forces and they can continue to receive their care. In fairness to the Minister, Deputy Simon Coveney, and the Department, the recently published White Paper on Defence includes veterans' affairs as a policy issue. It would be brilliant if it was given priority in the future.

The next part of the policy was communications. We have had issues with the various Departments in recent years. Through no fault of any elected individual or civil servant, there is a distinct lack of understanding of what the fuchsia appeal is actually about. The ball has been passed from one Department to another which can be quite frustrating, although it is nobody's fault. In conjunction with our brothers and colleagues in the IUNVA and the ARCO, we have proposed that there be a communications policy drafted between the various stakeholder agencies within the defence family. That policy would lay out who should contacts whom, what the remit of each department was and who the go-to people were for various issues.

As Mr. O'Connor and Mr. Kirwan have stated, we meet the Department of Defence and the military authorities a number of times a year in force headquarters, FHQ. We are in the process of setting up an inter-body group to explore this issue further and hope the joint committee will have an input. Ultimately it is the Executive that will be responsible for implementing our communications policy. The 2016 centenary commemorations are coming upon us hard and fast. The Department of the Taoiseach is responsible for certain events, while various other Departments have other responsibilities. It would be good to tighten up on who has responsibility for what. From our position, when that happens, there will not be an ad hocapproach but a more structured one which will benefit everybody. That is basically my role.