Gerard Craughwell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

Go raibh maith agat, a Chathaoirligh. Congratulations to you. You served well as Cathaoirleach in your last term and I expect you will serve equally as well in this term. I understand you had stiff competition. That is always healthy. I am delighted that you made it across the board.

The father of the House who introduced you today is a wonderful parliamentarian and a great friend. I thank him for what he has done.

I congratulate my fellow Galwegian, Senator Seán Kyne, who has been appointed Leader of the House. He is another great parliamentarian and a great Galwegian, but I will take strips off him in the coming weeks and months.

I mean to start as I intend to go on. Having been nominated to the Seanad by the ICPSA which includes the Defences Forces and An Garda Síochána, it is vitally important, as a reforming House, that we look at the legislation that was brought in following the financial crash.We should look at the revision of some of the FEMPI legislation in particular. The post-2013 pension scheme, which impacts the Defence Forces and An Garda Síochána, is detrimental to the survival of both organisations. Young commissioned officers and soldiers are looking for a way out because the pension is not attractive. Gardaí are leaving in droves because the pension scheme is not attractive. I am asking colleagues today that one of the things we do in the very near future is look at how that legislation has impacted our security services because, as we all know, we have been speaking about it in this House for the last four or five years. The Taoiseach, Micheál Martin, has taken a particular interest now in the vulnerabilities of the State when it comes to security and defence, particularly in things such as undersea cables. The Cathaoirleach will remember that when I first came to this House, there were nine Irish Navy ships at sea. Today, there is one ship at sea at any given time. As the Taoiseach pointed out today, the Air Corps does not have the capacity to defend our airspace. In these troubled times, I ask that we take defence as something really serious to address over the coming months.

I know that my friend and colleague, Senator O'Loughlin, has always been very much on side with the Defence Forces as a Kildare woman. Now that we have a second Kildare Senator here, there might be a bit of competition between the two of them but I am looking forward to it.

Once again, I congratulate the Cathaoirleach, the colleagues who have returned and the new ones who are here. We lost a number of very fine Senators in the recent brutal election. It was a brutal election. We did not all get 169 votes, but nonetheless, I guess one is rewarded for that.