Tom Clonan (Independent)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I echo everyone's congratulations on Deputy Conway-Walsh's appointment as Cathaoirleach. I look forward to working with her for the next couple of years. I agree with her regarding the prioritisation of the discussion of the triple lock. There has been a lot of misinformation and disinformation in public discourse in the past number of months. My research has ascertained that there have been more than 50 opinion and analysis pieces in the Irish broadsheet media such as the Irish Examiner, The Irish Times and the Irish Independent since January on defence and security. The vast majority of them contain the idea that we ought to relinquish our neutral status and that our neutral status such as it is - military non-alignment - is something to be ashamed of or that it is in our national interest to join a more formal military alliance - either a European army headed up by Germany and France or NATO. There are a lot of myths and inaccuracies in circulation. I have been writing in the defence and security sphere for 25 years and I can tell the committee that when pitching to editors in the broadsheets, one might be lucky to get one or two feature pieces into the broadsheets in a month. To get more than 50 into the broadsheets speaks of a very sustained public affairs and media relations campaign. There are a number of very high-profile opinion leaders in this area who keep reiterating the same myths around neutrality and trying to decouple the triple lock from our militarily non-aligned neutral status. I agree with Senator Craughwell that we should have informed voices to get some accuracy on that in the interests of the public, particularly in the context of a Bill being brought to Cabinet later this month on relinquishing the triple lock.

I also agree with everyone regarding the remit of the committee. Having served on a number of committees such as, for example, the Joint Committee on Disability Matters and the Joint Committee on Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth, I know that a committee has to have the wherewithal to hold stakeholders to account. If we are so limited as has been suggested to cables and cybersecurity, it makes the work of the committee effectively meaningless. I will tell members why. We are at an inflection point in this Republic with regard to national security and defence for two reasons. The first is that our defence in the maritime, ground and cyber domains is a complete failure. We are Europe's weakest link. This has been acknowledged by Government and I welcome the recommendations of the Commission on the Defence Forces but the de facto reality is that we do not contribute. We are not net contributors to intelligence in Europe or internationally. We have not generated any meaningful intelligence since before the Good Friday Agreement.

That is possibly part of the peace dividend. We are net recipients of intelligence and that places Ireland in a vulnerable and weak position. For example, we only know that Russian aircraft is operating in our controlled airspace because our partners choose to tell us so we do not know what else is happening. That is something that is set out. We have a duty of care to protect the State and its citizens from internal and external threats. To confine the business of this committee to simply cables and cybersecurity at a time of crisis within the Defence Forces is a nonsense.

Another issue is that the primary intelligence agency of the State is An Garda Síochána. While reference was made to J2, it consists of a very small number of staff officers who do not have the resources they require. They do not have the resources to gather or generate intelligence in a meaningful way. We do not have, as is the case in other jurisdictions, national technical means. Therefore, it makes no sense for us not to be able to bring in the State security agency, that is, An Garda Síochána, to answer very simple and straightforward questions. I am sure it would be anxious to come in and talk about the resources it needs and the apparatus and architecture of an effective intelligence agency that would be fit for purpose in the 21st century.

There is an attempt to frame our defence and security exclusively in the context of the war in Ukraine and Putin's criminal invasion of Ukraine. It is a mistake to do that because in ten or 15 years' time, Óglaigh na hÉireann will no longer exist and An Garda Síochána will no longer exist. They will have been replaced by something possibly called the police service of Ireland or defence forces Ireland. In the next ten years, we have to fundamentally redesign policing and the administration of justice, intelligence, defence and security and we must do that in the context of an all-island solution where at present, we have six counties in NATO. I do not know if there will be six counties in NATO in ten or 15 years' time but the expectations for security on this island will be very high and the guarantees for security will be very high so we have to have a defence force and a security and intelligence agency that not only are fit for purpose in the 21st century - they clearly are in crisis at present - but also are acceptable to everybody on this island, including the 1 million or so people at a minimum who have serious questions and reservations about what is going to happen next. It behoves us as public representatives not to exclusively frame defence and security in the context of a war in Ukraine but to frame it in the context of what is going to happen next on this island. If we prepare for it, it is possible that it could be successful but if we do not prepare for it and if a committee like this is excluded from discussing these matters, it will be a failure and our children and grandchildren will have to live that experience. Members will have to forgive me but as I am a member of the disability matters committee, which is due to convene at 9.30 a.m., I must leave this meeting. I will try to come back in and thank the Cathaoirleach for her forbearance.