The Council of the European Union press release on PESCO has a promotional video that opens with the line, "In a troubled world, citizens want the EU to offer them more protection", followed by images of fighter jets, drones, Apache helicopters, armed troops running off military transport helicopters, aircraft carriers and warships, all to the tune of the kind of aspirational and emotive modern classical one would get on an advertisement for a new Mercedes car. Apart from that, there is no detail as to what exactly it will mean for those who sign up, especially in terms of actual warfare. The only thing that is obvious is that the arms industry is about to make even more money because, for some vague reason, we all need to be stocking up on guns and locking up our borders. What is this vague threat? Why does the EU need all these warships, fighter jets and aircraft carriers? The EU was set up with the aim of ending the frequent and bloody wars between neighbours which culminated in the Second World War, or so it says on the European Union website. Now, it seems that if one wants to stay on the right side of the EU, one must sign up to enrich its arms producers. The German Defence Minister, Ms Von der Leyen, the main driver behind PESCO along with the French, said in 2014, "I believe that joint armed forces would be a logical consequence of an increasingly close military co-operation in Europe". After PESCO was set up in November, she said this was, "another step in the direction of the army of Europeans".

We seem to be the only country that is in denial and refusing to acknowledge that an EU army is being created. We are struggling to pay members of the Defence Forces a proper wage and some 335 Army personnel left voluntarily in 2017 alone, yet we are now going to join PESCO, which states that members must commit to year-on-year real increases in defence spending and investment. The speed at which the Council of the European Union has made this turn towards beefing up EU defence capabilities is frightening. In the space of seven months we have gone from arguing about €90 million of EU money being spent on defence research over a period of three years to the European Commission in June proposing the mobilisation of €40 billion by 2027 for research and development of weapons and military hardware through the European Defence Fund.

Our neutral status is already on a shaky footing. The lack of warning, debate and detail around joining this new military group, when we can join any time in the future, give us good grounds for fearing that this could be the final nail in the last notions of Irish neutrality. This matter is going to committee today and will be debated and voted on tomorrow. I did not hear one radio station mention it this morning and the public does not even know this is happening. There should be a proper debate in the public realm as well. Given that should take some time, I do not believe there should be a vote before Christmas. It is unfair to do so, given the people are, generally, unaware it is even taking place.

I have a clear view on this matter. My view is that a Europe that is worth building is a Europe that is worth defending. For a very long time, all of Europe has relied on the United States to provide for its defence. There are real threats to European security and, over time, rather than relying on the United States to defend Europe and pay for European defence, Europe should provide and pay for its own defence and not be dependent on the United States in the way it has been since 1945. That is what PESCO and European security and defence co-operation are all about. It is Europe starting to take responsibility for and control over its own defence, not relying on the United States in the way it has done until now.

In Ireland, however, we have a particular, different view. We have a long-standing tradition of non-alignment and neutrality, one that I and this Government will defend because we believe our non-alignment and neutrality makes us stronger and gives us more influence around the world. PESCO, for us, is going to be something different than it perhaps is for other countries. The reason we want to join PESCO is precisely because it is not what the Deputy says it is for us, because we are going to join it on an opt-in, opt-out basis. We will only opt in to certain programmes and certain parts of PESCO that we want to be involved in, for example, counter-terrorism, given all European countries need to work together to defeat terrorism. Cyber-security and peacekeeping are further examples of areas we are going to opt into. I can assure the Deputy we are not going to be buying aircraft carriers, we are not going to be buying fighter jets and we are not going to be shopping around military trade fairs for any of these things, as that is not in our interest.

Defence spending will rise. We have already committed to an increase in defence spending that has been set out in the White Paper since long before PESCO. That increase in defence spending will go into bringing our Defence Forces up to the level we want them to be at, that is, between 9,000 and 10,000. It will go into pay increases, which have already started but which will kick in across January and through to October of next year. It will go into new equipment because we need new equipment for our Defence Forces.

Yes, we are going to increase defence spending, but we are going to increase it moderately and we are going to increase it so that our Defence Forces can carry out the job that we want them to do.

When it comes to PESCO, we are proposing to join on an opt-in, opt-out basis, only opting into the particular operations and programmes that we want to be a part of. In doing so, we are joining three other neutral countries that have already decided to join - Sweden, Austria and Finland, countries with long-standing traditions of neutrality and of not being members of NATO and that have already made the decision to join. I think we should, too.

If the Taoiseach is so hawkish and so confident that this is good for us, I do not understand why he is not prepared to allow for a more public debate on it outside the House. Did the Lisbon and Nice treaties teach the State about allowing people to think too much about these issues? For a number of years, we have witnessed the increased militarisation of Europe. The Taoiseach can say that what is happening now does not affect our neutrality, but there are few neutral observers who would share that view.

The Taoiseach says that we have relied for too long on the US to defend us. We are a small island. We have no intention of attacking anyone and no one will attack us. Why do we need the American military to defend us? We do not need it. Neither do we need a European army or to be a part of one for this island to be protected. I will tell the Taoiseach how to keep peace - do not bother anyone else and do not go to war with others. We should also stop allowing Shannon to be used as a US military base and a stopover point for the US to cause destruction, which has created many problems in the past 16 years. Do we not accept the fact that, even though the world is a less safe place today because the amount of arms has increased, we are now going to sign up to arrangements that will make us a part of that?

I do not accept that I am being hawkish. I do not think that sending peacekeepers all around the world is hawkish. I do not think that sending ships to the Mediterranean to rescue refugees and pull children out of the water is hawkish.

Sending them back to Libya is wrong.

I do not believe that using our Defence Forces and our police to train defence forces and police in unstable countries and new democracies around the world is hawkish. It is part of our obligations as global citizens and I think it is the right thing to do in the interests of our country.

We want to be involved in PESCO. Not on the same basis as everyone in Europe, but on an opt-in basis whereby we opt into programmes that we want to be part of, for example, peacekeeping, cybersecurity, counter-terrorism, sharing expertise, training and all those things-----

The Taoiseach knows how terrorism is defined. Some of our friends in Europe-----

-----and being involved in those kinds of programme.

For other countries in Europe, PESCO is going to be something different. They are going to opt as a bloc, en masse, into everything because they want Europe to be able to defend itself. France is in a different place than us, for example. So is Germany. Even now 70 years after the Second World War, there are American troops in Germany as part of Europe's defence. Europe as a continent needs to move away from that. We should be able to defend ourselves and not rely on Americans to do so, but that is not why we are joining. We are joining coming from a particularly distinct Irish perspective, where we are a neutral non-aligned country joining on the same basis as Austria, Sweden and Finland, opting into programmes as we wish to do so.

On this particular issue, and as we are mentioning the Defence Forces, it is worth informing the House that a Defence Forces exercise is taking place today in the Dublin area that will allow them to practice various operational and tactical procedures. Approximately 500 members of the Defence Forces, including the Army Ranger Wing, explosive ordnance disposal team and specialist search engineering team will be in Dublin today. In addition, the Air Corps and the Naval Service will provide support. The Defence Forces are working closely with the Garda in this exercise. The exercise will also help them to develop their procedures with An Garda Síochána and other emergency services and build their preparedness. The Defence Forces constantly prepare on an ongoing basis to support the civil authorities in the event of a national security incident. This exercise today is a part of our preparations for that.

The Government is still not paying them.