Seán Crowe (Dublin South West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I will begin with the conclusion of Mr. Dorr's contribution. I liked his comments about Kofi Annan's vision and his own vision of Ireland in the context of planetary matters. We are a small country and our history and so on are significant positives no matter where one travels in the world. When we met the Iranians, I pointed out that as a small state we do not have a hidden agenda like many other states. Whether it is in Asia, Africa or elsewhere, people accept that Ireland does not have the same agenda as other countries.

I think people accept that Ireland does not have the same agenda as many other countries. We are not trying to dominate or undermine their system of government and we are certainly not trying to exploit their people, which is a major positive factor in the area of trade. The Department used to just cover foreign affairs and human rights and so on, but it is now covering the whole trade aspect of it. Is that a positive development? People have concerns that the paths instead of crossing often go in opposite directions.

One of the witnesses mentioned the slow progress in the North. Earlier I was asking the Tánaiste and Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade questions on the failure of the Haass talks which ended with a document on which all the parties had to compromise. Unfortunately the Unionists did not feel they could step up to the plate in that regard. Part of the difficulty is that rather than working towards a shared future - the witness is right about sectarianism - there does not seem to be any agreement between parties in the North on basic things such as tackling poverty, bad housing and inequality. There is no agreement on the past and there is certainly no agreement on how we tackle the future. There seems to be a lack of vision there. One of the difficulties seems to be the insecurity of Unionists and their future on this island. They seem to be more interested in the politics of the next election.

Am I going on too long?