Defence Forces

Tuesday, 28 February 2023

Questions (330)

Darren O'Rourke

Question:

330. Deputy Darren O'Rourke asked the Tánaiste and Minister for Defence the amount that the Defence Forces spent on purchasing specialist fire appliances for Defence Forces fire services in the years of 2021, 2022 and to date in 2023, in tabular form. [10175/23]

View answer

Written answers

Tánaiste and Minister for Defence

The detailed information sought by the Deputy is not readily available within the time frame sought. At the request of my Department the military authorities are conducting the search, retrieval and collation of same. I will arrange to have this information forwarded to the Deputy as soon as it is available.

The following deferred reply was received under Standing Order 51.

I refer to the above-referenced Parliamentary Question for which it was not possible to provide a reply within the available timeframe. My priority as Minister for Defence is to ensure that the operational capability of the Army, Air Corps and Naval Service, is maintained to the greatest extent possible so as to enable the Defence Forces to carry out their roles as assigned by Government.

The Equipment Development Plan (EDP) published in June 2020, completed through extensive joint civil-military work, provides a comprehensive list of planned equipment projects by means of a five-year rolling plan. The EDP builds on the intentions set out in the White Paper in relation to equipment acquisition, modernisation and upgrade and has been developed to ensure that the Defence Forces have the major equipment platforms, ancillary equipment and force protection equipment to carry out their important roles both at home and overseas.

The current Defence Forces fleet of firefighting vehicles numbers eight (8) . The make-up of the current operational fleet of firefighting vehicles across the three services (Army, Navy, and Air Corps) is as follows:

Service Branch	Location	Operational Fire Appliances	In Stock
Army	The Fire Training Centre Engineer Group Defence Forces Training Centre	1	Class B Fire Tender
UNIFIL (Overseas)	Irish Polish Contingent UNP 2-45 Lebanon	2	Class B Fire Tenders
Air Corps	506 SQN Casement Aerodrome Baldonnel	5	6x6 Fire Tenders (4) 4x4 Scania CAT 3

Details of the amounts spent on contracts awarded from 2021 to date for the renewal of specialist fire service vehicles for the Defence Forces are set out in tabular form below:

Tabular Statement: Specialist Fire Appliances Total Spend exl. VAT for the Defence Forces 2021 to 2023

Year	Army	UNIFIL	Air Corps
2021	Nil	€229,000	€1,990,812
2022	Nil	Nil	Nil
2023	Nil	Nil	Nil

A breakdown of the 2021 spend includes €229,000 (ex VAT) which represents the final payment of the Class B Scania Fire Tender deployed to UNIFIL, the total cost of which was €347,670 (ex VAT). In addition, €1,911,117 (ex VAT) was spent on 1) two (2) new Rosenbauer Panther 6x6 Airport Fire Tenders, ordered from Rosenbauer UK Ltd in 2020, and delivered in 2021 to replace existing aging Airport 6x6 Fire Tenders and 2) the final payment of €79,695 (ex VAT) on one (1) new 4x4 RIFT Scania, ordered from High Precision Motor Products in 2019, and delivered in 2021.

The expected service life of these types of appliances is 15-20 years. I am satisfied that, with these new acquisitions and the planning for future procurements, the Defence Forces continue to have the necessary modern and effective range of equipment available to them in order to fulfil all roles assigned to them by Government.