Gerard Craughwell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I apologise for not being here for the witnesses' presentations. I had to attend an address by the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade to the Seanad and what I heard there did not instill much hope in me.

I wish to put matters in perspective and I apologise if I am going back over old ground. A total of 10,905 Irish students are studying in the UK; 23% of our goods are exported to the UK, valued at €26 billion; 41% of our agricultural produce, which is €4 in every €10, is exported to the UK; 35% of our food, beverage and tobacco products are exported to the UK, involving 150,000 jobs; and 45% of our basic metals, 35% of our leather and textile products and 85% of our dairy products are exported to the UK, on which exports 9,500 jobs depend. A total of 47,200 people are employed in the transport industry and I heard from the witnesses that a tax might apply to trucks passing through the UK. That scares the living hell out of me. A total of 16,791 second hand cars were imported from Britain into this country last year. All of that is about economics, money moving backwards and forward and all of the things that might be interfered with by tariffs. Those of us who are old enough will remember what it was like to queue up at the Border and wait to get through it but such a queue will certainly not help our 47,200 jobs involved in our transport industry.

A central problem is that we cannot have a bilateral conversation with the UK, our nearest trading neighbour, which probably takes the largest single amount of our goods and services, because the European Union says "No" to that. Representatives of the Border Communities Against Brexit appeared before this committee a few weeks ago. They gave us all the economic facts and figures as well but they cited one other element, namely, the rise of the old angst that existed between the two traditions in Northern Ireland, the rise of smuggling, criminality and all of that.

Deputy Brendan Smith or Deputy Breathnach mentioned previous situations were people who wanted to go to mass on a Sunday have had to travel many more miles to get there because a big hole had to be blown up in the road that was closest to the church to stop people crossing unapproved roads. When I consider all of this I find, having come from the Seanad where I heard what the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade say - that Brussels understands and that our colleagues understand our problems - to be not very helpful. Then I look at the UK Supreme Court ruling, on which we had a discussion earlier today, and I do not want to go into it because we will allocate some time to it, but it is safe to say at this stage that the Supreme Court ruling has placed the Good Friday Agreement in jeopardy. For the short time I have been here listening to Mr. O'Ceallaigh and Mr. Arnold, they have probably given rise to even greater fears in me. Their understanding of what is going on is clearly ahead of many people around here.

The Good Friday Agreement is what it is all about. The rest of these things can be resolved through negotiations but when we consider the amount of things we have to negotiate, I think it will take 20 years to negotiate our way through what is here when we get down to the micro level. The Good Friday Agreement is where the freedom of movement comes into play, were one can sit in one's car, drive to Belfast and not be stopped on the way. That is the most important aspect.

In terms of the political uncertainty, and I do not want to delve into or interfere in the politics of Northern Ireland, but for the first time in my life I was attacked on social media by a member of the other tradition, the Unionist tradition. It is no secret around this table that I served in the British army and some of my Unionist friends, or those who would be of the Unionist persuasion, jumped to my defence. Is that where we are headed? When Mr. O'Ceallaigh made the point that there is no mention of Ireland or Northern Ireland in some of the documentation coming out of Westminster, that gives me a fair idea of where we are going. The worst form of nationalism is driving Brexit. I will understand if Mr. O'Ceallaigh does not want to comment on that but, from my perspective, that is the way it looks. It looks as if the UK is pandering to a particular mindset. In so doing, is it possible that the UK would chuck Northern Ireland and the Good Friday Agreement onto the pyre of past interests?

There is a desperate need for this committee to have people like Mr. Arnold and Mr. O'Ceallaigh advising it. They are people with independent minds who can come in here and give it to us straight. They spoke about cross-Border institutions and in their documentation they see no real reason that should change. However, it will change if Article 50 is triggered without legislation in place to protect the Good Friday Agreement. There will be no cross-Border institutions and there will be no requirement for them because there will be no Good Friday Agreement. I am not sure that we are going the right way here. They may not feel comfortable commenting on this but I believe we need a single point of contact in this country dealing with Brexit. We need a senior Minister, somebody with an economic background, perhaps the Minister, Deputy Bruton, or somebody else, appointed to oversee Brexit. The UK has appointed somebody and we need somebody.

I agree with the witnesses about dealing with our friends in Europe. We have got to be over there talking to them all the time. Colleagues of mine have been over there and I have been there. I have brought up the unique Irish problem and the answer I have got was at best benign. I brought up the unique Irish problem at a conference at which I was the only speaker from Ireland and when I did so the chair thanked me for my input and said we need to move on to discuss the concept of a European army. That concept throws one other constitutional problem at our feet, namely, our total opposition to being involved in any sort of a European army.