Gerard Craughwell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

Garretstown is a beautiful beach; I have been there.

The Department of Transport has set out its preferred tenderer for the search and rescue contract and that is Bristow Ireland, which I congratulate on the job. I am not one bit sorry to see that CHC has not gotten over the line. However, the people who worked for CHC are brave, solid heroes in my view who put their lives on the line on a daily basis to save lives both inland and on the seas around Ireland. I would like Bristow to now make a statement that it will start to consider a transfer of undertaking to keep those people working. There will be people today in CHC who are concerned about their futures. They are all family people. They deserve some sort of guarantee as to where they will go with their futures. From our point of view, this House and committee did much work that influenced the way this contract went. It was a good day for Ireland that we did what we did. As we go on now, Bristow needs to know that we will be watching from this House. However, we also need to be sure that there is oversight of everything by the Department of Transport from day one so that we do not ever again find ourselves in a situation like that which led to the report relating to Rescue 116.From that point of view, I wish the best of luck toBristow and we will see how it goes from there. I hope we see the Air Corps involved at some stage in the not-too-distant future. I want to find out, as regards the fixed-wing element, whether that aircraft will be stationed in Ireland. It should be stationed here. I suggest that Waterford Airport would be an ideal place for it. It could cover both the south and west coasts, but also the east coast. I do not want to hear we have a fixed-wing element somewhere in the UK because those fixed-wing aircraft carry specialised equipment and we do not want a foreign aircraft scanning Irish coasts.

On the consultative forum, my colleague Senator Clonan is 100% correct. We have no idea who is speaking-----