Jim Walsh (Fianna Fail)

Cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire Stáit go dtí an Teach. There are many people alive in Northern Ireland today who would not be but for the efforts and, indeed, the leadership of the Taoiseach and the British Prime Minister. While I commend them for the leadership they have given and for the success of the Belfast Agreement, the political parties – the Unionist Party, the SDLP, Sinn Féin, the DUP, the PUP – all deserve great credit as well. It is easy to criticise them for some of the failings and shortcomings and some of the mistakes, but we must bear in mind tremendous progress was made and it was made with their support for a large part of the period.

I welcome the comments of the Minister regarding the continuation of the North-South bodies. I would have been somewhat critical of the last minute changes in the Good Friday Agreement where we got into North-South bodies on areas which perhaps did not have the potential or were not as important as the areas of co-operation. Nonetheless recently it was interesting to hear Northern Unionist politicians argue that there should be a North-South agricultural committee. Members of the House would have heard a prominent member of the Unionist Party say that would be in the interests of their agricultural sector. Therefore there are opportunities to be developed.