Seán Crowe (Dublin South West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

It is an understatement to say that I am disappointed. The Minister of State says that he is happy to announce this. I do not know if the Government had any plan to announce it at all. Ireland's deeper integration into the EU's military system is completely unacceptable and unwanted by the vast majority of Irish people.

Does the Minister of State accept that there are many people working within the EU structure who wish to build a military structure to complement NATO and clean up its mess under the guise of peace building? This is what PESCO is about. We are told there are no spare funds to go to positive social and economic programmes in areas such as youth unemployment projects, community regeneration, and improving public services such as health care, but it has already been announced that €1.5 billion will be spent annually on aggressive military projects which ultimately will facilitate a standing EU army. Any EU policy which aims to increase EU militarisation is a potential threat to Irish neutrality and the Government should veto these plans. Today's announcement is hugely disappointing. There has been no conversation or discussion in the House on the matter, just an off-the-cuff remark. It is lucky that we put this question down for the Topical Issue debate or the Minister of State would have barrelled ahead without any debate in the Dáil whatever, just as he usually does.

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