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

The updates I have got to date have been largely procedural relating to how the group is going about its work, including who it is reaching out to, resourcing, accommodation and things like that, to make sure a proper support structure is in place around the work this independent group of people is doing. I committed to, and wanted to have, an interim report because I wanted there to be an opportunity for the independent review to address issues early if it needed to, within six months rather than 12. It will be up to the group to decide what it wants to put in the interim report, whether that is reporting progress towards finalising at the end of the year or specifically dealing with certain issues, making recommendations around those issues, and having the evidence base to be able to do that by the end of July. I do not know which approach it will take but it has the option to do either of those things.

If there are early actions the review group would like us to take, those may well be consistent with the action plan for the implementation of the Commission on the Defence Forces because there are quite a lot of recommendations and statements around cultural change, complaints procedures, the environment for women in the Defence Forces and a whole range of issues around that, which will also be part of our action plan for change I will bring to Government next month. We will be informed by the end of July in the interim report, but to have a complete picture we will need to wait for the full 12-month period. The time to go to the committee will be when we have a full picture of what has happened and a series of recommendations that will go with that.

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