Charles Flanagan (Laois-Offaly, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank Ms Leonard Dibra for the manner in which you assembled a team of experts from across the United States. As I said at the outset, I did not mean to inconvenience anyone with an early morning meeting but we were very keen here, as we approached the end of our term in parliamentary session, to have an opportunity to engage, acknowledging the fact that we have not done so over the past 12 months. Certainly, Ms Leonard Dibra and her team have left us in doubt as to the importance of this engagement. I thank her again and acknowledge the work that the coalition manages right across through California, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, New York, Philadelphia and Washington D.C.

It is also timely that we have this meeting now because as we break for the summer, the focus will be heading towards budgetary matters in September, and of course the Department of Foreign Affairs budget, and support under the emigrant support programme, ESP, as well as various other headings, are issues which are important to us in the committee. We go into that aspect of our work armed with the great work that you do on behalf of Irish communities. We certainly hope that the positive relationship between the Department of Foreign Affairs and our Government and your coalition will continue and will be manifest in the budget for the ESP and associated programmes. It appears to me that the Covid-19 response fund has been put to very good use and even though we are moving towards the end of Covid-19, hopefully, it seems to me from our engagement that there still is a requirement for Covid-19 funding through your centres. I want to acknowledge the positive relationship between yourself and our consular team across the United States of America. That is crucially important to us, as parliamentarians, and indeed to all Irish people. In fact, the connection is such that our current consul in Boston is Dr. Laoise Moore, who was policy officer to this committee not long ago, and I would be grateful if you would pass on the regards of the committee to Dr. Moore, and thank her for her work and indeed acknowledge all the work of our consuls and their team across the United States.

As well as thanking you, I want to acknowledge that we have more work to do. It is important that we would meet again before the end of the year. We have work to do in terms of the immigration issue, listening closely to what Mr. Staunton has said about possible timeframes and the need to ensure active engagement on the part of our people in Washington D.C., including Ambassador Mulhall, with your group. We should acknowledge that within the next few weeks, we will have the arrival of Ambassador Cronin, although she must go through the various hearings that are part and parcel of the system.

Assuming that these matters can be dealt with, I would expect that during the course of the autumn she will be here. We can take it that this committee will engage with her and her team in Dublin. There is much work to be done between Dublin and Washington and this committee, as parliamentarians, and the coalition. I know my members will ensure that we have an opportunity for further engagement during our autumn session. In the meantime, we wish your work continued success. We thank you for what you are doing and look forward to further and more positive engagement over the coming months.