Mr. Peter Sheridan:

I will make a start on some of them. I have to say I have not detected a softening in the "Leave" position. I think it is a conversation that happens daily with people, particularly those who said they were voting "Leave". All of us are interested in whether there will be another referendum. I have not detected a move in that direction. I spoke recently to a businessman who voted "Leave". I asked him why he did so. He said he built his case on the fact that there are 65 or 69 words in the "Our Father" - I cannot remember what the exact number was - but there are 29,000 words on the storage of cabbage in the EU. That was his only reason. When I asked him whether he was still of the view that the UK should leave the EU, he said he was. I have not detected any softening in this regard. I heard Mike Nesbitt say recently that he took a group from his party to Brussels for a fact-finding mission, but they came back without finding any facts. I think that is probably a fair comment about this issue.

If Senator Craughwell's suggestion about a refugee camp were accurate, one would have to ask why there is no refugee camp at the Border now. At the moment, there is nothing to prevent the people who are currently in Calais from camping in Dundalk. Why has that not happened? What would change after Brexit to make it happen? I am not sure that would be the case.

The former Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, spoke on the issue of Brexit at the Northern Ireland Economic Conference in Derry yesterday. I asked him a question not dissimilar to the question asked by Senator Craughwell. The logic is that the negotiation will happen between the UK and the EU Council. The Republic of Ireland represents one twenty-seventh of that. As much of the negotiation activity will centre on trade and economics, I am not sure to what extent we will be able to get issues like the Good Friday Agreement and the Border on the agenda. Given that there are 1.7 million people in Northern Ireland and 60 million people in the rest of the UK, one can guess where attention will be focused. There are 4.7 million people down here. I imagine the Irish Government will put its own people first and centre in this process. I have a personal concern about how we can get Northern Ireland on the agenda. I have heard politicians, including the Prime Minister, saying it is a significant priority for them. I am not saying I disagree with them, but I wonder how relevant Northern Ireland will be when the negotiators get into the heat of the discussions. Northern Ireland was not particularly relevant in the referendum, so it is difficult to see how it will be relevant in the negotiations.

The Senator also asked whether the business community has moved ahead of the political world. I think businesses are struggling because they do not know what the terms will be. Some movement of businesses is probably evident already. I read an article the other day which suggested that many lawyers are starting to set up in Dublin. While that might be great for Dublin and the Republic of Ireland, it starts to build tensions that might not be particularly helpful in the future. None of knows what the impact of this will be, or where it will go.