Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I too want to contribute to this debate. I am very dubious about it. I want to salute ar an gcéad dul síos the men and women of our navy. I wish them well and safe passage. The fact is that we are down to almost 700 people, and we are supposed to have 1,000 as a minimum. We have neglected the men and women of the Naval Service and, indeed, our Army. We have paid them badly and allowed a brain drain and skills to be robbed elsewhere. Then, we want to be involved in every kind of mission on show.

I do not support what the Libyan Coast Guard does. Indeed, it has been a long time since Charles J. Haughey sat down in a tent with the late Colonel Gaddafi and made a beef deal. At that time we had relations with them, and we were able to do that. Today, however, they are cowboys, and many atrocities are going on there. For us to send a vessel out and to be reduced to only one vessel at home is quite reckless, and without cast iron guarantees to this House that they will not in any shape or form be assisting or training or having any kind of association with the Libyan Coast Guard. We have heard stories recounting the awful things it did. Personnel stood idly by and pushed refugees back and everything else. We have to cut a cloth according to measure. We are attaching our wagon too much to these big issues as if we were some kind of superpower. As Deputy Michael Collins and others said, we cannot defend our own huge shoreline and fishermen. It was up to the fishermen to go out to the Russian boats in County Cork approximately one year ago.

I, too, wish all the diplomats and their families and friends in Sudan well. Hopefully, they will all get home. We were badly exposed again, however. We did not have an aeroplane or a ship or anything to get them out. We are depending on the goodwill of our neighbours, France, Spain and other countries, to get those good public officials out and try to get them to safety. Then, hey presto, we have said we will send out 12 Army personnel. One would think we were sending out a flotilla or a battalion; it was 12. We should be ashamed of ourselves. We want to be attached to all the things that are going on in Ukraine while dancing up and down and paying homage to the Prime Minister there. We are running out and back in a Ukrainian friendship club and we cannot even support our own Army and navy at home. That is what is going on here and it is a mockery and a sham.

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