Lisa Chambers (Mayo, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Nobody mentioned money in this conversation. The Minister described members of the Defence Forces as the most important part of the conversation. He has had since mid-July to analyse and digest the report, yet he is giving RACO one day to do likewise. Is this fair? Is RACO, the representative body of the soldiers who are the subject of the climate survey, being afforded an adequate period to do so considering the time the Minister has had to consider the report?

The general secretary of RACO stated that management had yet to engage with his organisation on the findings of the survey. In his words, it "does little to give confidence to members that senior management are actually interested in addressing genuine service concerns of personnel". I agree with him. The Minister's actions to date have not given any confidence to the representative organisations that he is interested in taking their views on board considering that he will give them a mere 24 hours to analyse the report before the meeting in Limerick. This is highly inadequate given the time the Minister has taken to consider it.

See this speech in context