Vincent P Martin (Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I commend Senator Clonan and the Independent Group Members on tabling this important motion on what we in the Green Party regard as a crucial issue of Ireland and a much-valued neutrality. We have a proud history of neutrality of Ireland, given our Defence Forces have the longest unbroken record of overseas service with the UN of any country. This has always centred on humanitarianism and peacekeeping. Earlier this year, the Government approved the decision to move to level of ambition 2 over a six-year period to 2028. This will result in an additional 2,000 civil and military personnel to the current 9,500.

There are many actions in the Government’s response to the high level action plan arising from the report of the Commission on the Defence Forces that will greatly improve the operation of the Defence Forces. In particular, the appointment of a gender adviser reporting directly to the Chief of Staff will be an improvement and must have a strong role in preventing previous abuses from being repeated.

In a debate concerning neutrality, it is vitally important we think about where we want our resources going and what lines there are between neutrality and breaking that line of neutrality. It is difficult to appear as a neutral country when we cannot adequately protect ourselves from air, sea and cyberattacks.The increased focus on cyberdefence is very welcome and is encouraging to see the funding and focus on this aspect increasing. My colleague, the Minister of State at the Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications, Deputy Ossian Smyth, has done a lot of work to strengthen the National Cyber Security Centre, which has greatly expanded its staffing over the past year and will be given a dedicated headquarters. The need for more resourcing for cybersecurity has been evident since the cyberattack on the HSE and instances across the world where this is becoming more common. The Minister of State is working with other countries in similar positions to learn lessons from them and apply them back home. I commend him on his work.

In respect of climate change, the Defence Forces have a huge role to play at home as well, in responding to the worst effects of global warming. Whenever there is widespread flooding in Ireland, it is the Defence Forces that step up to help. These events will only get more frequent and more severe. The programme for Government identifies climate change as an increasing security threat across the world and a significant factor in the instances of war, famine, forced migration and disaster management and commits this Government to support the Defence Forces in addressing these challenges. We need to further consider the necessary and crucial role the Defence Forces will play in responding to much more regular adverse weather events in Ireland.

I want to discuss and highlight a number of issues that are not contained in the wording of this motion but which I believe would help ensure safeguarding and neutrality, proactively using a soft power for peace and securing a more appropriate, modern, maximum democratic consensus for sending properly-resourced Irish Defence Forces personnel into potential conflict zones. A UN that has been increasingly polarised in recent times is still part of our triple lock. This has prevented Ireland in the past from supporting a neighbour state's peacekeeping missing in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, to name but one example, because of a veto at that time at the Security Council. While I support the motion's modifications to wrest back control of the decisions to send Irish peacekeepers abroad, I respectfully suggest a consideration be given to the following suggestion, namely, in the interest of widening the democratic consensus and still maintaining a link to the UN founding principles, the movers of the motion - perhaps they will respond with the Minister - might consider an amendment with a view to enhancing the State's independence and latitude in the deployment of the Irish Defence Forces personnel abroad. I support the concept of a triple lock, however, I suggest an amendment to this that would require the decision of the Government; approval by Dáil Éireann; review by Seanad Éireann, which is so often left out and forgotten about, and finally, and this is the change, permit the State discretion to act on its interpretation of proposed actions being compliant with the UN Charter. That no longer ties our hand to the UN Security Council and takes a lead rather than looking into the room for Russia and China to tell us what to do. Given the increasingly non-representative nature of the Security Council, I suggest peacekeepers be deployed based on compliance with the relevant chapters of the UN Charter and potentially involving the opinion of the Attorney General, thus maintaining the principle without being blocked by the politics of the United Nations.

In regard to properly funding staff and a reform of the Defence Forces, which was the basis of the recent Defence Forces review, I suggest consideration be given to the following more specific definition of what "properly funded" means. To properly fund Ireland's Army, Air Corps, Naval Service and cyber capability, we need to move to at least level of ambition 2, as described in the Defence Forces review in order to vindicate our sovereign neutral status and properly secure our land, air, maritime and cyber domains. Irish ambassadors often observe that most UN member states are small states; many of them former colonies. These states identify with Ireland's size and history, with our commitment to the rule of law, equality, justice and multilateralism, and with the country's interventions in voting positions on decolonisation and disarmament at the United Nations. I will conclude by saying Ireland has used its position on the UN Security Council to advance consideration of how to transition from peacekeeping to peace-building and that is so important. Ireland's exercise of soft power is also very important. Finally, I ask the Government to give consideration to appointing a Minister of State for defence and proactive military security with an exclusive portfolio within the Department of Defence in all future Administrations to properly lead and advocate for Ireland's defence, security and sovereign neutral status through active military security.