Gerard Craughwell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I will first draw attention to the Taiwan Strait. The International Civil Aviation Organization, ICAO, is responsible for air navigation and it has set rules about how air navigation pathways might be changed. In the past few days, China has decided to cut off a number of vital pathways for air navigation in the Taiwan Strait. The M503, W122 and W123 flight paths are now all closed. Once again, this is China is flexing its muscles against a small state that has a democratically elected president and government.We should be calling this out. We should be recognising Taiwan in this country. To hell with the One China policy that is in some way hampering Taiwan. We saw what happened with our own citizen in China, Richard O’Halloran, and the way he was treated. The Chinese do not give a continental damn for the rule of law.

I wish to raise another matter. I will circulate a document to all Members of the Oireachtas today called Closing the Backdoor, published by a think-tank called Policy Exchange in the UK. We can argue where it comes from and its political genre but what is stated in its report is 100% accurate. We are the weakest state in Europe. We are the weakest of the eastern flank of the United States and the western flank of the United Kingdom. We have no way of knowing what is in our sky or what is under our sea yet we have massive cables passing through our economic zone, carrying some 97% of east-west economic data. It is simply not good. I listened to the Defence Forces Chief of Staff being interviewed on RTÉ Radio 1 and he was asked about primary radar, which is essential to establish what is in our sky. He estimated it would take 24 to 36 months before we would have primary radar. That is simply not good enough.

Level of Ambition 2 is about two years old and we still see no development in that area. We still see the numbers falling and now we are beginning to see the number of Garda falling. I asked not so long ago for a debate with the Department of public expenditure and reform on the pension scheme. The post-2013 pension scheme is killing the uniformed services – Garda, Defence Forces, prison officers and fire officers. Nobody wants to be in those jobs now because there is no pension at the end of it. Indeed, the single pension Act hits a number of people in this House as well, including me.