Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

For the record, I am not making any assumptions in my statements today. If people took that from what I said earlier, I say that I am not prejudging any outcomes from an independent review. That will be a matter for a robust and independent process that involves skilled and experienced people. They will make their judgments and they will make their recommendations. We will deal with the truth of that. I just want to say that.

On Deputy Connolly's questions, we have not yet agreed a timeline. We have not even finalised the terms of the review. We are going through a process with other stakeholders, including the women of honour and including a group of women in the Defence Forces. We will also meet the representative bodies before we finalise all of that. Therefore, I cannot give Deputy the answer to those questions, but I hope she understands we need to go through a process. Rather than trying to give quick answers, we want to make sure we do this properly, give it enough time, and make sure the right people are involved in that review.

On individual cases, I have seen some protected disclosures that have come to me. I cannot speak about those publicly. I am not allowed to legally. Of course, we have a process within the Department of Defence to deal appropriately with protected disclosures when they come.

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