Mark Wall (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister of State with responsibility for defence into the House today. I believe it is her first debate here on defence. It is very important that she is here. I welcome the comments made by the Tánaiste earlier before he left the House.

Not for the first time in this House I will raise the issue of recruitment and retention. Indeed, it has been raised by colleagues in previous speeches. We all know the figures by now but it is important to state them again. Currently, we are operating with approximately 7,500 serving personnel. A previous White Paper stated that the figure should be 9,500 serving personnel. Of course the Commission on the Defence Forces report sets out an ambition of 11,500 serving personnel. That is why the conversations we are having today on the future of the Defence Forces are so important and should be treated as such.

I welcome the Tánaiste's confirmation that this is the first of two or three Bills he will be bringing before this House. We all take pride, and rightly so, in the great record of our Defence Forces in serving overseas and their continuing loyal and unwavering service in this State. The time has come to seriously address the decline. We have discussed the lack of ships on our sea, as a result of which we have drug traffic coming through on an almost daily basis. Most of our ships are tied up in Cork. We discussed the lack of investment in the air force and the lack of numbers currently serving in our Defence Forces. We need to ensure we attract new recruits and develop those new recruits into serving personnel. We also need to retain those who are serving currently in our Defence Forces.

My own party welcomed the establishment of the Commission on the Defence Forces. We debated the outcome of that commission's report at length in this House. We supported many of the measures which were outlined in that report. We emphasised the urgency of bringing forward legislation. That is why I state again that this is an important Bill we are debating here today. The senior Minister has said he will bring forward a Bill on the triple lock, which I look forward to debating, together with any other issues he may wish to bring forward here. That is important when we talk about where our Defence Forces sit today.

In the Bill before us today, the Government proposes to provide for a new external oversight body for the Defence Forces. The new entity is to be responsible for overseeing and monitoring the human resources of the Defence Forces and reporting to the Minister of the day, as the body deems appropriate. As my colleague, Deputy Howlin, outlined in the Dáil, the oversight body's duties, as set out on page 14 of the Bill, which provides for the proposed new section 322 of the 1954 Act, include the recruitment of members of the Defence Forces. As I have said, this is a critical issue. The oversight body will also be responsible for the induction, training, education and performance management of members of the Defence Forces; the operation of a competition process for the promotion of members of the Defence Forces; and the operation of a complaint or grievance process by or under section 114 of the Act. These are important issues when we talk about recruitment, retention and the skill sets which are involved. This external body is an extremely important new entity, as was recommended. Every consideration should be given to how it will begin its work and assist in the crisis I have outlined. I refer to how this body will play out on a daily basis, as I am sure it will when this Bill is implemented.

It will come as no surprise to the Minister of State that I wish to raise the issue of the Secretary General of the Department of Defence being an ex officio officer of the oversight board. I know that my colleague, Deputy Howlin, tried to tease this out at various stages in the Dáil debate. He was never given a compelling rationale from the Tánaiste and Minister for Defence as to why the Secretary General will be a member. As he outlined in the Dáil debate, the Secretary General of the Department of Justice is not a member of the Policing Authority. We welcome the setting up of this board, as I have said, but why would a person who is responsible for the drawing up of its terms of reference also sit on it, even if, as has been mentioned, he or she will pop out for certain conversations which will take place during its work? It would seem to many that the independence of this much-needed board could be compromised by the Secretary General of the day sitting on it while the important issues I outlined earlier are being discussed.

Another issue I would like to take up is the fact that members of this board are to be appointed by the Minister of the day and are to include specific skill sets as set out in the proposed new section 323 of the 1954 Act. The stipulation for the chairperson is that he or she may not have been a member of the Defence Forces of this or any other state.Questions were raised in the Dáil about the lack of military experience of the chair of the board. Perhaps, the Minister of State could confirm in her reply whether this will change. Are we going to have someone with a lack of military experience on an oversight board when we have a retention and recruitment crisis?

As I and other colleagues have mentioned, the petitions of PDFORRA, RACO and other organisations to have representation on the external body are compelling. As colleagues have done, I ask the Minister of State to consider these again. I disagree with an official from the Department, the Secretary General, being on the board but, if that is to be the case, we should surely have a member of the representative bodies sitting on it as well. That should be the case. The Tánaiste and the Minister of State need to look at that again because the representative bodies are daily looking at issues, such as the retention issue, that this oversight body will need to discuss.

On Part 3 of the Bill, I have looked at the explanatory memorandum and I welcome the fact that "The Bill also provides for the creation of a statutory framework for the Minister for Defence to grant consent to the Permanent Defence Force representative associations to associate with the Irish Congress of Trade Unions (ICTU)". I do not know who chose this language but the next line reads "and to impose conditions that will apply to the granting of any such consent". In many people's definitions, to "impose" on somebody implies that something will be done against his or her will. I do not believe that such language should be used.

As the Minister of State will probably be aware, I have continually raised the need for trade union representation for the representative bodies of our Defence Forces in this House and I welcome the fact that there has been some progress to date. However, with this Bill, serious questions remain as to what that representation might look like. It seems that, under this Bill, any association would need to be independent of and not associated with any trade union or any other body outside of the Defence Forces and the Minister of the day retains the right to withdraw. It has been said that this is a unique proposal in trade union law. The employer, that is, the Minister, gets to set out the cases and the manner in which, and the conditions and the restrictions under which, the allowed representative associations are allowed to associate with a trade union. It is a very odd set of circumstances to begin with.

From my many dealings with the representative bodies, it seems there is a total and utter understanding of the absolute limits of any contemplated strike action. We need to look at our EU counterparts and how they deal with trade union membership for their own defence forces. I will take the Netherlands as an example. We have a recruitment and retention crisis. I speak to new recruits and they want a body to represent their interests like any other person entering the workforce. They see the benefit of being represented, knowing that there are limits on any actions but also knowing that they will have a voice to stand up for them when they need it most. In my view, the limits to be imposed under this Bill on having a view or associating with congress are far too restrictive. As I have said, conditions are being imposed. This runs counter to any recruitment and retention plan this much-needed new board may come up with.

I welcome the section of the Bill that sets out to protect the term "Óglaigh na hÉireann". It rightly makes it an offence to usurp the proud title of the Defence Forces, something we have unfortunately witnessed too often down through the years. I acknowledge the work of Senator Malcolm Byrne and his colleagues on this matter. It is a part of the Bill that we in the Labour Party totally support.

In the time left, I will take the opportunity to talk about the Curragh Camp in my own county of Kildare. I have previously brought up the issue of the derelict houses with the Tánaiste. In replies, he has informed me that a plan to bring these houses back into use has commenced. I would appreciate any update on that. We are talking about recruitment and retention. Every Member has mentioned that today. I continue to get many requests for assistance with housing from Defence Forces families. When the Defence Forces have houses and land, this course of action should be pursued. This is where we need to go to retain our members and to attract young families into the Defence Forces. The dereliction on the Curragh is despicable and should not be happening. I believe there is a plan in place. We would like an update.

Like my colleague, I appreciate the removal of the age restriction. I look forward to debating this Bill with the Minister of State and with the Tánaiste as it goes through the various stages in this House. Many questions are still unanswered following the Dáil debates. We will most likely be tabling amendments, as we have done before. I ask the Minister of State to consider the points I have made today because it is the future of our Defence Forces that we are talking about and numbers are dwindling as we speak.