Clare Daly (Dublin North, United Left)
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72. To ask the Minister for Defence if he is satisfied that due regard was given to the potential pitfalls of military Keynesianism for Irish defence policy and Irish neutrality in the discussions surrounding the drawing up of the White Paper on defence. [41207/15]

Clare Daly (Dublin North, United Left)
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I have tabled this question on foot of the Minister's concerning comments about trying to plug the Defence Forces in with innovators and entrepreneurs. It seems that such people will be given access to the Defence Forces to help them to develop jobs and so forth. There are clear dangers in such a strategy, such as we might not be able to control the end product in military terms. I seek assurances about the level of debate that took place during the preparation of the White Paper. What safeguards does the Minister intend to put in place to ensure the plug-in he is encouraging does not involve us dealing with the likes of Israel and Saudi Arabia?

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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I am glad the Deputy has asked this question because it allows me to clarify the matter in the House. I think the Deputy sometimes likes to paint me as some kind of-----

Clare Daly (Dublin North, United Left)
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Hawk.

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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-----militarised warmonger.

Clare Daly (Dublin North, United Left)
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The Minister does it himself.

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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If the Deputy had been part of the conversations that took place during the preparation of the White Paper, she would know that nothing could be further from the truth. We are talking about spending significant sums of taxpayers' money on building a peace and leadership institute in the Curragh. We hope it will train people from universities all over the world in how to keep peace rather than how to make war. While our Defence Forces have a defence capacity, we are focusing our resources primarily on their interests abroad. This means protecting them, training them and ensuring they are effective in peacekeeping. That is why I am looking for a bigger budget. I am not doing so for any other reason.

In terms of the platform that is the Defence Forces infrastructure, we want to work with the private sector to develop technology that can help the Irish Defence Forces to do what they do more effectively.

That is not about testing weapons but is about things like testing kite technology on the decks of ships, which is happening at the moment. It is about putting better communications systems in place in order that we can have improved and secure communications and we can test them within the Defence Forces. It is about improving observation, improved safety training and all the other practical things we can test within the infrastructure that is a Defence Forces training camp, a Naval Service ship or an Air Corps airplane in order that we can improve the technology and link in with many of the technology innovators we have in Ireland.

I often use the example of Cork Harbour and the Irish marine and energy resource cluster. Some 48 companies now work in the Beaufort laboratory next door to the naval base and we have an opportunity to work with some of them in marine innovation and marine technology using Naval Service vessels. It is not about testing weapons or anything else on those lines, as some people like to paint it.

Clare Daly (Dublin North, United Left)
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I did not say anything about testing weapons. I spoke about the Minister shacking up with regimes such as Saudi Arabia and Israel, which also pride themselves on their ability to develop security measures and high-tech IT solutions such as those the Minister has lauded in the House. Private firms, with which the Minister wants us to link up, are in the business of profit. They are not interested in world peace and are not interested in providing the best product. I specifically asked what measures the Minister has put in place, given the inability of the arms industry, including manufacturers, suppliers and security personnel around the world, to control where their products end up. For example, with what type of partners will the Minister go into consortia for the purposes of accessing funding under Horizon 2020? What assurances will the Minister give us that he will have nothing to do with companies based in Israel or Saudi Arabia? I ask because they are the ones which are profiting most and are looking for partners in that type of technology. I do no think that is compatible with our neutrality.

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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I will not start naming individual countries but the statements in the White Paper are about promoting innovation through the Defence Forces. Public private partnerships between the Defence Forces and private, predominantly Irish, companies are well under way and have been very successful. We are developing new designs, technologies and innovations that may well be very useful to the Irish Defence Forces or may have a very useful application in the civilian world and have nothing to do with defence or military capacity whatsoever. If 9,500 people are training and have a lot of equipment, it makes sense to match up that equipment with some of the need that is out there in the private sector to test, design and develop new technologies. We are doing this in a spirit of innovation, not in a spirit of war-making. The Deputy has probably read the White Paper. It is an assessment of risk and is consistent with Irish foreign policy in terms of neutrality. It is about promoting peace and stability worldwide and providing basic security response capacity in Ireland.

Clare Daly (Dublin North, United Left)
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Despite the best intentions of the Minister, where the product ends up is outside his control unless he stipulates in advance that he will put in safeguards prohibiting co-operation with countries which have a proven pedigree in this regard. For example, Israel has supplied over 60% of the world's drones since 1985 and new types of technology such as the Sea Knight, an unmanned patrol ship which was used to fire upon Palestinian fishermen in and around Gaza earlier this year, were developed elsewhere but are being used for coercive activity. These could just as easily apply to some of the projects about which the Minister spoke.

Given that Saudi Arabia ranks fourth in the world in terms of military expenditure, spending more than $80 billion in 2014, and is branching out into the areas to which I referred, what assurances can the Minister give that Defence Forces personnel will not become involved in consortia making bids to access funding from Horizon 2020? The Minister implied that we would do so. He should provide an assurance that we will not do so as this is the minimum level of human rights compliance required.

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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I did not imply anything. I stated that this will be an open and transparent process, which will use basic infrastructure in the Defence Forces to be able to test, develop and design new products that can be useful to us. We have made clear that it will not involve facilitating the testing of weapons or munitions. That is not what this process is about. I encourage Deputies to read the White Paper as that is made clear in the document.