152. Deputy Catherine Murphy asked the Tánaiste and Minister for Defence if he will provide a schedule in respect of the number of instances in which the military intelligence branch has placed tracking devices on vehicles as part of investigations; whether these trackers left the jurisdiction, and on how many occasions per tracker, in the past ten years to date; the jurisdictions in which the tracker visited; whether it returned to the State; and the value of items intercepted and or seized as a result of these surveillance engagements, in tabular form. [44271/24]

As the Deputy will appreciate, for security and operational reasons, given the sensitive nature of such matters it would not be appropriate for me to disclose details of surveillance operations undertaken by the Defence Forces.

However, I wish to advise the Deputy that in relation to the Defence Forces' military intelligence function, there are a number of statutory provisions on which they rely for the collection and processing of intelligence, for the purpose of maintaining the security of the State, viz.

Interception of Postal Packets and Telecommunication Messages (Regulation) Act 1993;

Criminal Justice (Surveillance) Act 2009; and

Communications (Retention of Data) Act 2011.

Judicial oversight of the use of these statutory provisions by the Defence Forces (and An Garda Síochána) is provided by a designated judge of the High Court, who reviews the operation of the Act, and reports to the Taoiseach at least once every 12 months concerning any matters relating to the operation of the Act that the designated judge considers should be reported.

In his most recent report Mr. Justice Michael Twomey, appointed as the Designated Judge pursuant to Section 12 of the Criminal Justice (Surveillance) Act 2009, reviewed the operation of this Act by the Defence Forces for the period 1st August 2022 to 31st July 2023.  His report was submitted to An Taoiseach in November 2023.

In this report Mr. Justice Twomey advised that he had inspected the Military Intelligence files for court ordered surveillances for that period (11 in total).  Mr. Justice Twomey stated that “In each case, the application for an authorisation was made by a “superior officer of the Defence Forces” and authorisations were issued by a District Court Judge.”. He added “In all of the files, a full report was contained on the file, setting out the necessity for the application and, where relevant, the results of the surveillance following authorisation by the District Court Judge.”.

Mr. Justice Twomey further stated in his report “I was impressed by the professionalism of the members of the Army involved in surveillance work which is of great benefit in the fight against activity which threatens the security of the State. It is not appreciated, because of its covert nature, the extensive and important role which the Army plays in protecting the State against attack in all its modern technological forms.”.

Finally, I want to make it clear, based on the reviews undertaken by the Designated Judge, that I am satisfied that the surveillance operations undertaken by the Defence Forces comply with the statutory provisions provided to them by the Criminal Justice (Surveillance) Act 2009.