Ruairi Ó Murchú (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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462. To ask the Taoiseach and Minister for Defence the plans there are to implement the report of the Commission on the Future of the Defence Forces; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [39155/22]

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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On Tuesday 12 July Government approval was given for a move to ‘Level of Ambition 2’ (LOA2), as set out in the capability framework devised by the Commission on the Defence Forces.

This will result in the Defence budget rising from €1.1 billion to €1.5 billion, in 2022 prices, by 2028, the largest increase in Defence funding in the history of the State. This will allow for the required substantial transformation and investment in recruitment and equipment that were identified by the Commission.

The move to LOA2 will require an additional 2,000 personnel (civil and military) over and above the current establishment of 9,500.  Work has already commenced on this with the recently announced recruitment campaign, ‘BE MORE’.

Some specific initiatives include the immediate commencement of planning for military radar capabilities, including primary radar and the establishment of an Office of Reserve Affairs with the priority objective of developing a regeneration plan for the Reserve Defence Force.  

A High Level Action Plan (HLAP) was also approved.

This High Level Action Plan sets out the response of Government in relation to each of the 130 individual recommendation: Accept, Accept in Principle, Further Evaluation or Revert.  103 of its recommendation have now been accepted by Government for implementation, or accepted in principle, with decisions on the remaining 27 recommendations to be taken pending some further consideration that is necessary. This can be broken down as follows:

- 48 recommendations are Accepted for implementation;

- 55 are Accepted in Principle with further consideration required on the optimal approach to meeting the intent of the Commission;

- 17 are desirable and will require Further Evaluation with key stakeholders, of the resource, policy, financial and legislative implications before a decision on implementation can be considered; and

- 10 will need to Revert to Government at a later stage

The HLAP has been published on the Defence Forces’ and Department of Defence websites [1],

The HLAP also provides detail as to the implementation structures which will be put in place, these will comprise:

1. A High-Level Steering Board, chaired by the Secretary General of the Department of the Taoiseach;
2. An Implementation Oversight Group (IOG), independently chaired, which will oversee and drive progress on implementation; and
3. An Implementation Management Office (IMO) which will drive day to day implementation with the support of a professional and highly-skilled transformation team, drawn from both internal and external sources.

www.military.ie and www.gov.ie/defence.