Mr. Eoin Miche?l McNamara:

On the NATO undersea cell, I think they call it the "undersea telecommunications cell" or there is a draft name for it like that. If we participate in that, we will essentially get a seat at the table. It will be mostly information-sharing. NATO is an intergovernmental alliance in which it is every ally or member state in the north Atlantic's responsibility to look after its own exclusive economic zone unless there are co-operative agreements, for example, the Baltic air policing agreement taken by NATO allies multilaterally or multinationally. If we enter into an arrangement like that, we will have as eat at the table. A lot of information will be shared with our policymakers, civil servants and people in the Department of Defence and the Defence Forces. It will definitely improve our situational awareness. We will know what is going on and the operations our partners undertake and we will be able to raise our concerns. It will not be treaty-based defence co-operation. It will not tie us to any all-for-one or one-for-all type of deals but it would be very good for our capacity and our situational awareness and the information we have at our disposal as to what is going on proximate to our waters.

On the UK RAF, I will be very short and sweet. We should come clean on that. We should be transparent. We talk about disarmament, arms control and defence sector transparency globally, for example, at the UN, Ireland was very for that. You cannot go around the world talking about integrity and transparency in the defence sector if you are not transparent and treating your people with integrity at home. On that deal, no one wants to see precise operational plans or State secrets or anything like that, so the national security excuse for not disclosing more is a red herring. We should know the basic contours of that deal. For example, is the RAF charged with protecting Irish airspace? That is a matter in the Irish national security interest and will be crucial to take our security and defence forward. Are we okay with that? Are there other arrangements? Could we look after this ourselves? It is important for the defence of our country going forward that we open this up.