Tom Clonan (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Tánaiste for coming in to make his presentation and I thank Senator Craughwell for sharing his time with me.

I really welcome the establishment of this tribunal. As we heard in the debate in the Dáil last week, particularly in the contribution of Deputy Jim O'Callaghan, it is an extraordinary achievement to get a fully sworn public tribunal and that is the achievement of the Women of Honour and the members of the Defence Forces Justice Alliance who are here today. They came out in September 2021 and identified themselves. They and their families and everybody associated with them had to go through all of the trauma again and to be identified in such a public way. I also want to thank the Tánaiste for his commitment to this and for getting it over the line. In relation to the work I did 25 years ago, a former Fianna Fáil Minister for Defence, Michael Smith, one of the Tánaiste's predecessors, also showed that commitment to transparency by agreeing to my request back then for an independent Government inquiry into my research which was challenged by the military authorities at that time. It is all part of this journey.

The tribunal will really focus and hone in on the complaints procedures and whether people's complaints were properly investigated and dealt with. To that end, I want to give the House a couple of

quotations from serving officers in the Defence Forces.

When we complained we were punished. The company commander said that it reflected poorly on us as potential officers but we did it out of desperation. They had no respect for us. The guys in our class, they had no respect for us, but especially the officers. We looked up to them but as it turned out, they had no respect for us either.

That was from a group of young women who were sexually harassed in the workplace, as was the following: "...any complaints about sexual harassment, the Army tends to do damage limitation and to try and minimise the effect. Certainly, our complaints are not properly dealt with."

These are direct quotations from serving officers of the Defence Forces. Finally:

I was assaulted. I complained. I did not get equitable treatment. Women in the Defence Forces are not encouraged to complain about these issues. They are not encouraged to report on them. The Army is more concerned about how it looks than if a woman gets raped and if you do [complain] the court sits in hell and Satan is the judge. I would categorically state that if any woman in the Army is harassed, assaulted or raped, inform An Garda Síochána, not the military police. Otherwise you will not get justice.

Those interviews are from August, 1999, 25 years ago. Those interviews are on the public record for 25 years. Of the 60 women I interviewed, 58 expressed no confidence whatsoever in the reporting and complaints procedures and I am sure that the judicial inquiry will interrogate that very closely. In the context of that last quote, I want to thank the Tánaiste and the Government for changing the rules this year. Their reaction to the IRG report was swift in that any complaint of a sexual assault will be investigated by An Garda Síochána and not by the military authorities.

The Representative Association of Commissioned Officers, RACO, did a very interesting engagement survey last year which was published in the latest edition of its magazine Signal. One of the questions asked of respondents was: "Do you feel that the IRG report on March 23rd was a fair reflection of the conduct of commissioned officers?" A total 644 officers participated in the survey and 58% of them agreed that the IRG's comments do reflect the behaviour of some officers, while 3.6% said an outright "Yes". A total of 54.4% of serving officers agreed that the IRG's observations about the misogynistic and violent culture of the Defence Forces was a legitimate concern. Respondents were asked if they believe there is a culture of reprisal in the Defence Forces and 37% of officers, or 238, said "Yes". On the question of whether it is safe to speak up at town hall meetings, 50% of officers said that it was unsafe and 20% said they would be unsure about speaking out about wrongdoing.That is a total of 464 serving officers in our Defence Forces. To anybody in this House or in the other House of the Oireachtas who says, "Well I didn't experience it and, therefore, it doesn't exist", that is gaslighting and you do a disservice to the service of our veterans and you do a disservice to those survivors of that abuse, because this is not about a few rotten apples. This is about a system that is rotten to the core and I hope the judge-led tribunal will not only deal with the symptom of it, which is the way in which complaints are handled, but will actually get to the core dynamic, which is abuse of power.

I commend the Tánaiste on setting up this tribunal. I particularly welcome his commitment to allow those who did not use the complaints process, because, as I said, many of them had no faith in it, to come forward. I hope, for all of the wonderful people who serve, that the judge can really get to the heart of this because we need Óglaigh na hÉireann. We need our Defence Forces and the State needs them.

A total of 83.3% of those officers surveyed in the RACO survey last year said that they did connect with the Defence Forces' values of respect, loyalty, selflessness, physical courage and moral courage. Therefore, I have faith in our wonderful sailors, soldiers and air crew to get through this and out the other side to have a better Defence Forces that is fit for the 21st century.