Women of Honour report: What the Government will do next

Among the measures in the wake of the Defence Forces report is a plan to amend the Defence Act 1954 to enable sexual assault allegations to be referred to An Garda Síochána. File picture: Sam Boal/RollingNews 

The Government has agreed to implement measures to address significant issues identified in the report into sexual abuse, bullying, and harassment within the Defence Forces. They include:

• A statutory inquiry will be established to investigate whether there have been serious systemic failures in dealing with individual complaints, including sexual misconduct. Tánaiste Micheál Martin will consult with groups including the Women of Honour before bringing the terms of reference to Government.

It is hoped this State inquiry will be established before the end of the year and yesterday Mr Martin warned that he does not want the investigation to go on for “years” as has been the case with other State inquiries.

New laws will be drafted “quickly” to establish an external independent complaints process for members of the Defence Forces;

• The Defence Act 1954 will be amended to provide the legislative basis to enable allegations of any type of sexual assault in the Defence Forces in the State to be referred to An Garda Síochána. Mr Martin said: “I think in terms of sexual assaults I’m very clear that has to go to the gardaí.

“We’ve already directed the Chief of Staff to do that — sexual assaults right now are to go to the gardaí.”

However, complaints regarding allegations of abuse or assaults which take place while personnel are serving overseas will still have to be brought to the military police. The report found that there is a higher risk of rape and sexual assault incidents occurring while members are on overseas duties;

• A non-statutory inquiry will be set up to look into the process of ‘medical boarding’ and also a study of deaths by suicide of current and former members of the Defence Forces over the last 20 years;

• The Tánaiste will spearhead a significant programme of reform and culture change within the Defence Forces, with the support of newly-appointed external expertise. This will run alongside implementation of the recommendations of the Commission on the Defence Forces;

• An external oversight body will be set up immediately to oversee the Defence Forces and ensure that recommendations in the report are implemented.