Dáil Éireann Debate, Thursday - 2 February 2023
28. Deputy Bernard J. Durkan asked the Tánaiste and Minister for Defence the anticipated future role of the Defence Forces, Army, Naval Service, and Air Corps in future national and or European defence measures; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [5172/23]
View answerThe White Paper published in 2015 set out the roles of the Defence Forces, these roles were not changed in the White Paper Update 2019.
The White Paper on Defence published in 2015 set out the Government intention to put in place a new fixed cycle of defence reviews. Such reviews are common practice internationally and give reassurance that policy remains up to date and relevant to changing future circumstances.
The first of these reviews, the White Paper Update was published in 2019. The second of these reviews, the Strategic Defence Review stage, was due to commence in 2021. With the establishment of the independent Commission on the Defence Forces by Government in December 2020, a decision was taken to pause commencing the Strategic Defence Review until the Commission on the Defence Forces had completed their report and Government had been given time to consider the report.
Following detailed consideration of the Commission Report the Minister for Defence brought to Government a High Level Action Plan and a Memo for Government which were approved on July 12th last year. Part of the High Level Action Plan was the progression of a number of early actions one of these being the commencement of the Strategic Defence Review.
The essential ingredients of the defence reviews process are to ensure an updated security assessment and a fresh consideration of the implications of this assessment for overall policy requirements, associated tasks, capability development and resourcing. As well as encompassing the Government agreed recommendations from the Commission on the Defence Forces, the future role of the Defence Forces both nationally and internationally will also be considered within the Strategic Defence Review.
Arising from the implementation of the recommendations of the Commission on the Defence Forces, a significant overhaul of the Defence Acts will be required. This will provide an opportunity to modernise the legislation in a range of areas, including, if considered appropriate, in relation to the anticipated future roles of the Defence Forces.
The first stage of the Strategic Defence Review will be security environment analysis to be conducted by an interdepartmental working group which is due to commence shortly.
