Vol. 536 No. 2
63 Mr. Shatter asked the Minister for Defence if he will meet the Representative Association of Commissioned Officers in view of repeated requests from them for a meeting; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [13971/01]
Last February I received a request for a meeting from the Representative Association of Commissioned Officers (RACO) to discuss the benchmarking process and other unspecified matters. My office replied to this request on 28 February indicating that benchmarking was being addressed at the appropriate forum and that discussions on other matters coming within RACO's remit should be pursued within the conciliation and arbitration structures that had been set up precisely for this purpose. In March and April, I received further requests for a meeting which indicated that an agenda was being prepared by the association. However, I have not yet received any indication of the issues they wish to discuss with me.
Representation was introduced in the Defence Forces in 1990 to provide members of the Defence Forces with an input into matters of concern to them. Under the representation arrangements, a range of fora are available to the associations, ranging from forum meetings with the military authorities to the conciliation and arbitration scheme with a council and various sub-committees which meet on a regular basis. The representative associations and the conciliation and arbitration branch also have ongoing contact with each other by means of written correspondence and phone communication.
I am convinced that the system of representation, with its conciliation and arbitration scheme, provides the association with an adequate platform for the presentation of its views to my Department and to the military authorities. I am satisfied that all issues currently on hand are appropriate to, and can be dealt with, through these structures.
Will the Minister confirm that he has not had direct meetings with the representative associations of commissioned officers or RACO since November 2000 when he attended their annual general meeting? Does the Minister agree he has not had personal meetings with them because he has been sulking for six months now, due to the criticism voiced at that meeting of his failure to deliver on promises he made to them at their annual general meeting in 1996 and his failure to give reasonable consideration to the very comprehensive document presented by RACO to the Minister to contribute towards the White Paper on Defence? Does the Minister acknowledge that he and civil servants in his Department have not been willing to attend meetings and have not held any such meetings since November? If the agenda which the Minister now says is outstanding is furnished to him, detailing specific issues of concern directly relevant to the Defence Forces which RACO wishes to discuss with him, will he arrange such a meeting?
It seems Deputy Shatter may well be living in a time warp which represented the position for the Defence Forces during the regime of the rainbow Government, when vir tually nothing was happening and there were constant meetings between the representative associations and the then Minister. Since that time, with East Timor, Kosovo and Sarajevo, we have been at a peak of our involvement in overseas missions. Procurement and acquisition of equipment for the three branches of the Defence Forces is at an all-time high. A sum of £45 million is being spent this year on the refurbishment of accommodation for all branches of the Defence Forces throughout the country—
The Minister is not answering the question.
—which in turn means that the military authorities are engaged actively every day in the development of the Defence Forces. In tandem with that, I have arranged to devolve to the military authorities up to 70% of the non-pay area, so they have complete authority in those areas. Deputy Shatter is missing out on the significance of the changes that have taken place.
Finally, on conciliation and arbitration, I expect RACO to tell me what its agenda is if it wishes to meet me. So far, it has not done that.
If the Minister is furnished with an agenda detailing a series of issues of concern to RACO, will he meet it? Yes or no?
I will certainly be very happy to consider meeting RACO when I am informed of its proposed items for the agenda. In spite of Deputy Shatter's inference that I have not met RACO because of developments which took place at the conference, I am well able to handle these matters. I have, of course, to take account of the office of Minister for Defence and the premeditated discourtesy by an association representing commissioned officers at the time.
Is the Minister saying it was appropriate for him, when Fianna Fáil defence spokesperson in 1996, to address an annual meeting of RACO and make a series of promises which were followed up by the Government and by Fianna Fáil in their election manifesto in 1997 and at a meeting in November 2000 to say it was a discourtesy for RACO to voice criticism of his failure to deliver on any of the promises made?
We must proceed to the next question.
Is that what the Minister is saying?
The irreconcilable difference between the association representing the commissioned officers and their private comment to me and their public utterances are a matter of grave concern for me.
Criticism in democracy will not be accounted.
The Deputy would love to be in my position. I have delivered on every promise.
