Billy Timmins (Wicklow, Fine Gael)

I welcome the opportunity to discuss the Cluster Munitions Bill 2008, which we published some weeks ago. We started work on it in the latter half of last year, motivated by international events and, admittedly, the work being done by the Government in the sector. We are conscious that a conference will take place in Croke Park in May and we believe it would strengthen our hand as one of the nations seeking to take a lead on this issue to have this legislation in place. The Minister will table an amendment to the Bill. While I agree with some aspects of the amendment, I disagree with others. When the Minister rises to speak at 7.40 p.m., I hope he will see it in his heart to accept the Bill as is.

I have reviewed previous attempts to introduce Private Members' legislation, namely, the landmines Bill, and noted the comments of some Members on the Government side of the House. I trust the Minister will not stand and call the Bill flawed or inappropriate, as occurs often. I recall the phrase "scribbled on the back of a cigarette box", but this Bill has not been scribbled on the back of a cigarette box. Rather, it is well considered and unique, the first of its kind. If the Government or our colleagues in the Labour Party want some aspects addressed, there is Committee Stage on which to do so. In recent years, that Stage has been flexible in respect of much legislation. I hope the Minister will accept the Bill.

Cluster munitions are possibly the most reprehensible weapon that can be used in conflict. Their main purpose is to inflict terror in the civilian population. They do not discriminate between soldier or civilian, mother or son, child or adult. The evidence of their work is clearly visible in several areas of the world, from Lebanon to Vietnam and Kosovo to Chad, as one witnesses the young child on crutches or the adult minus an arm. Long after the conflict is over, the local population can suffer from the horror of cluster munitions because the non-threatening design can arouse curiosity in the unsuspecting civilian. In the late 1970s, an unexploded mortar shell killed several children in the Glen of Imaal in County Wicklow. They played with the lethal weapon innocently, having found it in the range area.

Some cluster munitions are designed to explode long after initial contact. Even some of those that are designed to explode on impact can be faulty and explode at a later time, particularly on contact. Often, this contact is made by an innocent civilian or child. It is estimated that the Israel-Lebanon conflict in 2006 resulted in more than 1 million unexploded bomblets being deposited in the towns and hillsides of Lebanon. In Afghanistan, the humanitarian ration packs dropped from aircraft were difficult to distinguish from cluster bomblets, with both displaying a similar colour coding. To this day, several hundred people die in Vietnam each year from the remnants of war.

The first cluster bombs used were of German manufacture and were dropped during the Second World War. The design was elaborated upon by the Americans, Russians, Italians and others. Today, more than 30 countries produce cluster munitions and more than 20 countries use them. In the 1960s, the US used cluster bombs in Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos and the French used them in Chad. From 1994 to 1996, the Russians used them in Chechnya. From 1995 to 2000, the Sudanese Government used them internally against local rebel forces. As recently as 1999, the US, Britain and the Netherlands used them in Kosovo.

The footprint of a single cluster bomb can be as large as a football pitch. The fragments of exploding submunitions travel at high velocity. If even the smallest fragment impacts on an individual, it initiates wave pressures within the body that do horrific damage to soft tissue and organs. A single fragment can kill or leave one blind or without a limb. I served in Lebanon in the mid-1980s. Something that struck me when I arrived there was the number of young children with one leg, no legs, one arm or no arms. Most of those injuries were caused by bomblets whereas some were caused by a method to stun fish using grenades, which can be a dangerous occupation. To see the situation at first hand can leave an indelible impact on an individual.

After the Kosovo conflict in 1999, efforts were made to handle the mine problem in that region. According to the UN Mine Action Co-ordination Centre in Pristina, the total number of mines and unexploded ordnance cleared by March 2001 was more than 84,000.

Research has shown that the majority of victims are poor, uneducated males at work, comprising approximately 77% of the total confirmed casualties. Many of them are boys under the age of 18 years. In southern Lebanon, almost 90% of the land used for farming and grazing is contaminated with unexploded cluster submunitions. Some 98% of cluster munition casualties are civilians killed and injured while returning home in the aftermath of conflict or while going about their working days. Could we imagine being out for a picnic on a weekend in Ireland when, after our children run after a football they have kicked over a fence, we hear an explosion? This is what occurs in the countries in question.

While research in this area is difficult, it is evident that, for 400 million people living in affected countries, cluster munitions turn homes and communities into de facto mine fields. In Kosovo, 53% of casualties occurred in the two months after the end of the conflict. Most of the victims, those killed and maimed, were boys between five years and 15 years of age. Almost 200 people have been killed or maimed since the war in southern Lebanon ended in 2006. In Vietnam, 300 people are still being killed each year.

In 2000, the BBC reported that the bright yellow American cluster bombs, whether by accident or design, were visually appealing to children who found them. In May 1995, the Croatian capital, Zagreb, was deliberately targeted by Serb forces. One Serb general informed the press that, if the Croats launched an offensive, the Serbs would attack "weak points". He went on to state: "We know who the people in the parks are — civilians". They were targets for cluster bombs. During the Israel-Lebanon conflict in 2006, Hizbollah used cluster bombs when attacking Israel and the Israelis did likewise.

The civil war in Laos ended in 1975 officially. In the opening address at the Wellington Conference on Cluster Munitions in February of this year, Ms Hilde Johnson, deputy executive director of UNICEF, stated:

On January 17, nine children in southern Laos were searching for little crabs to eat. The children found a BLU 26 cluster bomb, which exploded. Three boys from nine to 14 years old died immediately, and a fourth 12 year old boy died on the way to the provincial hospital.

It is against this background that Fine Gael moves this Bill.

International efforts have commenced to ban these munitions. Under the Oslo process, which was launched in Norway in February 2007, approximately 46 countries committed to negotiate by the end of 2008 a ban on using, making, stocking or transferring cluster munitions that cause "unacceptable harm to civilians". Since then, many countries have taken unilateral steps to demonstrate their bona fides and give an added momentum to the process. The Bill seeks to improve our bona fides and to add momentum by putting Ireland in a position of strength next month.

In March 2007, Britain stated it would stop using two kinds of "dumb" cluster munitions that lack self-destruct devices. The United States is not a part of the Cluster Munitions Coalition. However, it has signalled some movement on the issue, albeit slowly. Both the United States House of Representatives and Senate passed the 2008 State-Foreign Operations Appropriations Bill, which includes a provision limiting the sale and transfer of cluster munitions systems to those that have a failure rate of 1% or lower and mandating that any country importing US cluster munitions only may use them against clearly defined military targets where no civilians are present. Despite objections to the restrictions, President Bush signed it into law in December 2007, effectively ending the sale of cluster munitions for one year.

The purpose of this Bill is to prohibit trade in cluster munitions. This legislation emanates from the Wellington declaration on cluster munitions, which was itself informed by previous international conferences in Vienna, Lima and Oslo on the prohibition of cluster munitions. It also is informed by the draft cluster munitions convention agreed at the Wellington conference on January 21 2008.

In so far as trade in cluster munitions exists in Ireland today, this is effectively symbolic legislation. Ireland does not produce or use cluster munitions and has no stockpiles to destroy, which is an important issue for other signatories to the Wellington convention. In that vein, the purpose of this Bill in prohibiting the trade, transit or procurement of cluster munitions is that it will set an example and contribute to the international movement to outlaw such munitions.

The portion of the Bill that will have significance for Ireland's contribution to eliminating cluster munitions is the restriction on financing companies engaged in the trade or procurement of cluster munitions. In so doing, Ireland will be going further than the requirements of the draft convention as it may be agreed and will be the first country to take a maximal approach to removing cluster munitions from international affairs by stemming the flow of finance to the production of munitions and by taking a step on behalf of the Irish people to demand their money must be used to finance projects in a clear and transparent manner.

The National Pensions Reserve Fund invested approximately €27 million in companies trading in cluster bombs last year. The fund has a share of approximately 25% of the Irish pension industry assets. It is not an unreasonable assumption to suggest the portfolio investment strategies of private pension fund investment companies are similar to that of the National Pension Reserve Fund and that, therefore, on a pro rata basis, the total Irish investment in cluster munitions is slightly more than €100 million.

It is hoped that by placing a requirement on banks and pension funds to declare annually that they have not financed companies involved in trade of cluster munitions, the social and moral voice of the people will be heard in refusing to allow their money to be directed to such companies. This first instance forced disclosure regulatory framework is the best way for this to be achieved. Nevertheless, Fine Gael's Bill provides for serious punitive measure to be imposed were compliance under this provision not to be attained.

I will outline the provisions of the Cluster Munitions Bill 2008. Section 1 gives the Short Title of the Act as the Cluster Munitions Act 2008. Section 2 is the definitional section. Cluster munitions are defined as "containers comprising explosive sub-munitions over an area which are intended to disperse these sub-munitions over an area in order to detonate them before, on or after impact". They do not include "flare and smoke ammunitions or pyrotechnical chemicals". The definition has been adopted from Article 2 of the draft convention on cluster munitions, which has emerged as the standard international definition and is the definition used in those countries that have already imposed bans on cluster munitions.

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