Eric Byrne (Dublin South Central, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank Mr. Aiken for his complimentary words about the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. The trade link is only two years old and I am interested in Mr. Aiken's comments on how he feels this is developing. He made a comparison between the structures in England and those elsewhere, and argued not just for a one-stop shop but also for an effective restructuring of Irish embassies so that Enterprise Ireland, IDA Ireland and Bord Bia might be more integrated into the embassy structure. He then went on to warn that we should not undermine the established and successful systems we have acquired down through the years. He might further elaborate on that. All of us around this table want more embassies opened with increased resources and we want the BRIC countries to be targeted and so on. However, the economic crisis is not permitting us to do that.

I and most members would concur with Mr. Aiken's views, which are strongly stated, that business abhors lack of certainty. Mr. Cameron suggested there would be a plebiscite. We are well used to plebiscites and not only have we have proven to Europe and the world that we are the poster boy of Europe but we have proven time and again with our referendums that we are very much integrated into and supportive of Europe. This was seen most recently in regard to the fiscal treaty, for which we gave 60% support. We are well used to these things. Given that we are speaking with the British Irish Chamber of Commerce, and having recently visited Northern Ireland, I think it disgusting that the Border that exists seems to be manned by terrorists and criminal elements, and there is abuse of legal trade and businesses, with the laundering of fuel, the smuggling of cigarettes and the culture of the Border country. Does the British Irish Chamber of Commerce have much of a relationship with InterTradeIreland? In talking about the bigger Ireland-England-Scotland-Wales relationship, what about our miserable Border that is so fluid and is creating havoc?

I thank the witnesses for attending. We are talking about huge sums of money here - €38 billion, €54 billion and then €14 billion in exports. Wearing our foreign affairs hat, we had the British Ambassador before us recently. Mr. Aiken spoke about the potential for UK and Irish trade missions in particular areas. We thought it interesting the British ambassador should mention his belief that there could be greater co-operation between Irish construction companies and the skills base that exists, given the downturn, and the British construction industry in targeting Arab or oil-wealthy cities which have huge capital infrastructure programmes. Does Mr. Aiken see anything coming from that suggestion?