Barry Ward (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire Stáit. I take into account what she has said and if it has not been done already, I am quite happy to second the Government's amendment. What she has said gives us an insight into the services provided.

This is a very strange debate to be having. We know a tender process is under way and yet a House of the Oireachtas is discussing what some of us believe the outcome of that tender process should be, which I believe is entirely inappropriate. I do not understand why we are doing that. I do not cast any aspersions on Senator Craughwell in that regard. This is an important issue that should be discussed; I have no difficulty with that. The tenor of this debate has been very much a qualitative analysis of what we see as the two competing interests in that tender process. I am slightly uncomfortable with that. I have listened to what the Minister of State has said and she has cleared up many of the issues for me in that regard.

I would like to address some of the issues I have heard mentioned in the debate. I am a great admirer of the Defence Forces in general and of the Air Corps specifically. They do us all an enormous service on a regular basis and we can be very proud of what our Defence Forces do both at home and internationally. However, a distinction must be made between the search and rescue role of the Defence Forces and that of civilian teams. It has been bandied about whether other countries have civilian or military facilities. I know the UK, Spain, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway and Australia have civilian services. I understand that the international trend in search and rescue is to move away from a military basis towards a civilian-run service.There are very good reasons for that. It is because the Air Corps already has a considerable amount of work to do. It is busy with obligations it has to the State, including troop movements and other activities. It already has a job and it makes absolute sense that it would not be tasked in addition to that work with the enormous responsibility of providing a constant service, not just now when I need it but every minute of every hour of every day of every week of every year. That is what SAR must be because if that is not what it is, it will cost lives. To put that burden on the Air Corps would be very substantial. That is why, internationally, SAR is increasingly becoming a civilian capacity with experts in search and rescue, and governments paying the associated costs. I think everybody agrees with that.

I am concerned about some of the comments suggesting that the Coast Guard has in any way failed us. We are incredibly lucky to have an organisation such as the Coast Guard, which is staffed and run by people who are enormously professional, tremendously competent and have a fantastic track record.

Much has been made of the fact that CHC is the company responsible for running the SAR service. CHC is an Irish company with Irish employees - more than 130 Irish residents who pay taxes here. It is a registered company in this country. Although CHC stands for Canadian Helicopter Company, it is an Irish company in no uncertain terms. All the people who supplied the Sikorsky helicopters around the coast of Ireland are Irish. I have met them.

I am from a coastal community. I know people who have been saved by them in Dún Laoghaire, Sandymount Beach and Dalkey Sound. I know individuals who have been lifted from the water to safety by these people. They live in my area. They live in Dublin. People who staff the Sligo base live in the north west and the people who staff the Waterford base live in the south east. The people who operate in Shannon live in Clare and Limerick. They are Irish people and CHC is an Irish company. I would be deeply unhappy at the suggestion that there is any deficit in the services provided by Coast Guard or CHC because I see no evidence for that.

Obviously, we are aware of a disaster that occurred some years ago off the coast of Mayo. Apart from that, however, I am not aware of any controversy in the delivery of the service. My understanding is that it has always complied with the terms of the contract and the obligations placed on it by the State, which is very important. We can rely on its track record of availability and service ability.

The other complication that exists is that while we have four bases and five helicopters to cover the Republic of Ireland, they also operate beyond the Republic of Ireland. They serve our coastal waters, where they often need to interact with vessels from other countries. More importantly, they serve adjacent jurisdictions, such as Northern Ireland and parts of the Irish Sea that are not under Irish jurisdictional control or even to the north of Northern Ireland. I do not know if that is a job that can be done by a military facility. I do not know how happy the United Kingdom would be to have an Irish military SAR aircraft flying along the coast of Antrim or something like that. It happens at the moment, but it is done by civilian aircraft under contract with the Irish Government.

As I said at the outset, I am surprised that we are having this debate. When this process comes to pass, it is important that we look at it on the basis of measurable, clear, fair and open terms, as the Minister of State indicated. The people proposing the motion and those responding to it all want a solid, reliable search and rescue service because we know that keeps our citizens and our residents safe. That is what has been happening. The process that is put in place must be fair and transparent in that regard and must deliver, after the fact, a service to exactly the same quality as that currently available.