Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Fianna Fail)
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96. To ask the Minister for Defence if he will provide, in tabular form by county, a breakdown for 2013, 2014 and to date in 2015, of the number of suspect devices that the army disposal unit has dealt with. [20923/15]

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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Primary responsibility for the maintenance of law and order rests with An Garda Síochána. The Defence Forces, pursuant to their role of rendering Aid to the Civil Power (ATCP), assist An Garda Síochána when requested to do so. The Defence Forces Explosive Ordnance Disposal (EOD) teams respond when a request for assistance is made by An Garda Síochána in dealing with a suspect device. Following post operation analysis these callouts are then catergorised and this would include viable devices, hoaxes, false alarms, post-blast analysis and the removal of unstable chemicals in laboratories.

The numbers of EOD call outs and the numbers of viable devices dealt with in 2013, 2014 and to date in 2015, by county, are set out in the tabular statement below.