Cathal Berry (Kildare South, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to comment on the budget. Overall, I welcome its thrust. It is not perfect, but it represents progress in some areas. I will focus on three particular sectors that are rarely mentioned in the Chamber anymore: defence, agriculture and the shared island programme.

I welcome the increase in defence expenditure. An extra €100 million represents an 8% increase, making for the largest defence budget in my lifetime of €1.35 billion. This is positive. It is neither adequate or sufficient, but it is a half step in the right direction. More important is how the €1.35 billion is going to be spent. We can throw around headline figures all we want, but this is where the focus should be.

I wish to express my gratitude to everyone on the Government and Opposition benches and at home who has been involved in this work for the past number of years. Worthwhile and dignified advocacy down the years has led to some progress, particularly from a pay perspective. As of today, a new private, three star, of 18 years of age or whatever age can start at €40,000. This is a psychologically important level to focus on and represents an increase of more than 50% on the €27,500 level it was at at the start of this Dáil. The patrol duty offshore allowance for the Naval Service was doubled nine months ago. There has also been progress in respect of the naval personnel tax credit and the ARW allowance. However, our military personnel are still the lowest paid public servants, so there is still much more work to be done. We need to focus on long service increments, the European working time directive and, in particular, overtime payments. Every other uniformed service gets overtime payments for rostered duty hours. It should be no different for a peacetime military.

Regarding premises, I acknowledge that there has been progress on buildings nationally, particularly at the Curragh Camp in my constituency. There is a new cadet school, new headquarters, a new engineering building and a new transport building. Work on a new communications building is also ongoing. There are two other buildings – one in Dublin and the other in the Curragh – I am not supposed to mention, but €35 million is being spent on them. However, more progress is needed. As the Ceann Comhairle will be aware, more than 60 family homes at the Curragh Camp are either vacant or derelict. This is unacceptable and unnecessary, particularly given the housing crisis. There should be a crèche in the Curragh, on the naval base in Haulbowline and at Baldonnel. If we want more women to join the Defence Forces, we must address these logistical issues. People will then join. Something else that is desperately needed is an east coast naval base in Dún Laoghaire, particularly given what is happening in the Irish Sea and given our critical national infrastructure, including the gas pipelines and electricity interconnector. The terminal is there, but it is almost vacant. We should take full advantage of it.

The money being provided needs to be spent on sonar and radar. In recent weeks, the Dáil has discussed aircraft travelling through Irish airspace without us knowing about them or what they were carrying. It took journalists rather than the State to point them out and that is not good enough.

Most metrics in the defence sector are going in the right direction now, bar people. The head count is still dropping, with the possible exception of the Naval Service. We heard approximately three weeks ago that the navy expects that there will be slightly more sailors at the end of this year than there were at the start, which is an important piece of information. For the first year in a decade, there will be a net increase in naval sailors. That is a positive development. The bottom line is, if pay rates are increased to normal rates, there will be a positive spin-off as well.

The Reserve Defence Force will be rejuvenated. The sooner that happens, the better. It is the natural conveyor belt of people into the regulars. The sooner we get that programme up and running, the better off we will all be.

The second sector I want to talk about is agriculture. It is hugely important, as I am sure the Minister of State, Deputy Colm Burke, knows from his own county of Cork. Generally, it is the poor relation. It does not have the same clout that it had in the past in this Chamber but it should because farms are the original SMEs. They are the lifeblood of rural Ireland and communities as well. I recognise and acknowledge the increase of approximately €150 million to in excess of €2 billion in the agricultural budget for 2025. That is positive. In particular, I welcome the tillage support scheme, which is important for counties Kildare, Kilkenny, Carlow and all the east coast, and the beef and sheep welfare schemes as well. I welcome the additional funding being put onstream to assist farmers in meeting their important climate change targets relating to biodiversity, water and air quality.

The Minister of State knows how hard it has been for farmers over the past two years. One bad year is bad enough, but to have two years back to back is almost a crisis. What we need is that the payments that farmers expect to arrive on time. They should be regular, they should be recurring and they should be absolutely reliable. What has happened over the past couple of years, where there have been delays in TAMS and ACRES payments, is simply not good enough.

Finally, I will focus on the shared island programme. There are some very worthwhile projects here, particularly the Warrenpoint bridge. However, one project that rarely gets a mention is the Mitchell scholars programme. The Taoiseach is visiting the White House in the next couple of weeks and I would like him to raise it with President Biden. The programme, founded by Trina Vargo and named after Senator George Mitchell, is a hugely important link between this country and America. They need €32 million as an endowment to keep this programme up and running. Currently, it is in abeyance. We can provide this funding because the links between this country and North America are important.

In summary, I welcome the general thrust of the budget but there is a huge amount of work to do. It is not perfect in any shape or form, but it is progress. I recognise that limited progress has occurred.

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