THERE HAS BEEN an increase in the amount of complaints and referrals to the Ombudsman of the Defence Forces (ODF) in the wake of the Independent Review Group (IRG) report into military abuse and harassment, a Dáil committee has heard. 

Mr Justice Alan Mahon, who is the Ombudsman was speaking before the Oireachtas Public Petitions Committee today.

Just two members of the 11 member committee, Sinn Féin Deputies Pat Buckley and Martin Browne, attended the meeting this afternoon.

The ODF provides military personnel with an independent and impartial external statutory complaint investigation system.

It is separate and independent of both the military chain of command and the Department of Defence.

In his opening remarks Judge Mahon outlined figures associated with the 2021 annual report for the body but he also spoke about the current volume of investigations this year. 

He said that one explanation for the increase in complaints to the Ombudsman may be associated with the publication of the IRG – this was a report documenting claims of alleged harassment, bullying, assault and sexual assault in the Irish Defence Forces.   

“In the first six months of this year, I’ve produced 24 reports to date, almost the same number for the whole of 2022 and this suggests that the total for this figure may exceed the 2021 total.

“This reflects the fact that complaint referrals for this current year, and this would include referrals from the tail end of last year, have so far been unusually high.

“A clearer picture as to the reasons may emerge,” he said. 

The IRG report was released earlier this year and Mahon believes that this increase is tied to the publicity before and after the publication.

“One possible contributing factor to the high numbers is the publication of the IRG report earlier this year and the attendant publicity that both pre and post dated this publication.

“However, it is, I believe, noteworthy that there has been a slow, albeit not significant increase, in what might be described as interpreting complaints, including bullying, and inappropriate behavior,” he said. 

The annual report states that 106 notifications of complaint were received by the ODF during 2021. This is a 32% increase on the 80 complaints notified in 2020.

Of those complaints, 74 were from serving or former non-commissioned personnel while 32 were from serving or former commissioned officers.

Of the notifications received during 2021, some 28 were withdrawn or resolved during the year, and 34 were referred to the ODF for investigation.

“I should emphasize that simply comparing one year’s figures with another does not tell the full story.

“Some investigations require many weeks of intensive work, while others may take only a couple of weeks to conclude, for example, in 2020, to one particular report took almost 12 weeks, spread over a couple of months to complete,” Mahon added. 

Mahon said that he has seen a “very slight” increase in gender orientated complaints, such as problems around promotion opportunities associated with maternity leave.

“In general terms, however, the complaints from female members of the Defence Forces do not appear significantly disproportionate to their overall numbers in the Defence Forces,” he added.