Gary Gannon (Dublin Central, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

I was about to say I intend to be quick but I do not have a choice. We have been offered five minutes to debate partaking in four European Defence Agency projects. I put it to the Minister of State and his Government that this is a farce. It gives us absolutely no opportunity to undertake the required level of scrutiny or to fulfil our mandate. These issues matter. I do not want to say this is fine and let it through on a wink and a nod. The Minister of State says that partaking in these common European Defence Agency programmes makes good economic sense but how do we know? What opportunity have we had actually to scrutinise the legislation and look at the proposals? He also said that none of the moneys that Ireland will spend on these projects will result in weapons or ammunition going anywhere else. When my constituents ask me about that, with hand on heart, I will have to say that I am not really aware of the details because we only received one ten-minute presentation from the Minister of State, a couple of newspaper articles and five minutes to stand on ceremony to say this is great, go ahead. The issues with defence personnel in my constituency pertain to the fact that many of them cannot afford to live in the city when they come back from taking part in overseas missions. Will any of the matters we are being asked to discuss here make them safer? Will any of them mean that they can afford to do their work with greater levels of dignity?

I have to say, I do not trust the Government on this issue. I really do not. From the moment I first came to this Chamber, when talking about defence and neutrality, we have been told that we should not be afraid to discuss these issues and, from that day, we have absolutely agreed and said that we should have that debate and discussion. The consultative forum on security gave absolutely no opportunity for debate, scrutiny or discussion. There was no opportunity for those of us across the Chamber who have a different view to partake in it. There are very real discussions to be had about the changing nature of security and defence in the world but that does not mean that we, who have a proud tradition of neutrality and who have, for more than five decades, had armed servicemen and servicewomen place themselves in harm's way in the name of peace, need to change our approach. Nothing the Government has put on the table so far has led us to believe anything but that it is pursuing a creeping militarisation and that there is a desire on the part of Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil to change the framework of neutrality in this country. It matters.

I am not going to take further part in this debate. I believe it is an absolute farce. We will support the Sinn Féin amendment to bring this motion to the committee. Why would we do otherwise? Five minutes is an insult to those people who have been asked to go overseas and to place themselves in harm's way in the name of peace.

See this speech in context