Dr. Duncan Morrow:

Thank you. I am very privileged to have been asked to come. To quickly give the committee some background information, I was chief executive of the Community Relations Council in Northern Ireland for ten years. I am currently at Ulster University as a lecturer and director of community engagement. I have produced an outline paper which I will not read as it is too long and I understand I only have five to seven minutes before questions are taken. If I go over the time allowed, I apologise in advance.

It is hard to exaggerate the level of achievement the Good Friday Agreement represents and the effort that went into it. People need to be really clear that it did not come from nowhere; it came from engagement on quite important and difficult historical issues and was ratified in a popular vote. It led to serious changes in the Irish Constitution and legislation.

In spite of the fact that the system of devolution has been relatively stable since 2007, it is still fragile in 2017. In 2010 there was a crisis over policing that led to the Hillsborough Agreement; in 2012 and 2013 there were flags protests; in 2013 and 2014 there were parade issues' in 2013 there were the Haass negotiations; in 2014 there was the Stormont House Agreement; in 2015 there was the Fresh Start agreement and this year there have been new Assembly elections. The situation remains very fragile, particularly in the North. In the middle of all this the Brexit decision in the referendum in the United Kingdom is a really significant act.

The two most difficult aspects of it are, first, that it is a unilateral Act in a context where the Good Friday Agreement was a joint and consensual agreement of which all of its bits were to fit a part and, second, it puts in question many of the issues in Northern Ireland. Uncertainty represents a really serious challenge in the context of the fragility that exists in Northern Ireland.

There are a number of things I will talk about beyond that. I was asked to speak about the implications for the Good Friday Agreement. Unilateralism in the context of the Good Friday Agreement and uncertainty are both really serious and significant issues, all of which have potentially very major knock-on effects in a context of fragility.

In terms of the referendum, the Northern Ireland turnout was relatively low. Participation was unusually high in middle class areas such as south Belfast and north Down. In west Belfast and Foyle, it was the lowest in the UK. It took a long time to catch fire in some of the republican heartland. North Antrim is the only constituency in Northern Ireland in which more than 60% voted to leave. All the constituencies touching the Border voted to remain. That leaves us with a number of specific issues. Something to reflect on is that public debate was relatively muted in Northern Ireland. The strongest media warnings about the implications of Brexit for peace and reconciliation came from the Taoiseach and former British Prime Ministers who have a personal stake in the Good Friday Agreement.

I looked at the Good Friday Agreement in detail to see where peace and reconciliation touches on it in a very specific and direct way. Reconciliation is at the centre of the whole deal. It is in the preamble and starts the whole event. I picked two phrases from the first three paragraphs. The first is, "We firmly dedicate ourselves to the achievement of reconciliation, tolerance, and mutual trust, and to the protection and vindication of the human rights of all." The second is, "We are committed to partnership, equality and mutual respect as the basis of relationships within Northern Ireland, between North and South, and between these islands." The questions this raises are at a fundamental level part of the issue. We will get practical but this is very fundamental. How far does Brexit represent a unilateral change to the concepts outlined, in particular mutuality and partnership? What does it do to the Good Friday Agreement? What is the status of it? To what extent is Brexit coming at reconciliation from outside and not taking it into account at all? Where there are incompatibilities, does reconciliation in Ireland have to be accommodated to Brexit or can Brexit be accommodated to reconciliation as it impacts on Northern Ireland? The question of the priority of those two things is absolutely central here.

There are also a number of areas, which I have outlined, that are really significant in terms of specific issues, one of which is the citizenship arrangements. The citizenship arrangements outlined in the Good Friday Agreement were unique and radical. There is a commitment to "recognise the birthright of all the people of Northern Ireland to identify themselves and be accepted as Irish or British, or both, as they may so choose, and accordingly confirm that their right to hold both British and Irish citizenship is accepted by both Governments and would not be affected by any future change in the status of Northern Ireland." That means that for all the people who live in the territory of Northern Ireland, there is an ongoing citizenship interest in the European Union. The European citizenship of all the citizens of Northern Ireland remains, which is a complex and unique circumstance.

The Good Friday Agreement says the North-South bodies are integral so we cannot abolish or unilaterally change them without unilaterally changing the other institutions because they are interlocking. The interlocking principle is significant and important.

It also says the North-South Ministerial Council will consider the European Union dimension of relevant matters so Brexit will have direct consequences for that. The agreement says the North-South Ministerial Council will consider it, "including the implementation of EU policies and programmes and proposals under consideration in the EU framework." What is the status of those elements of the agreement following Brexit? It seems to me to be very specific in terms of the future of the North-South bodies.

There has been a discussion about the language of special status. The only issue at stake here under the agreement is the question of status not specialness. The agreement makes provisions "[I]n recognition of the Irish Government's special interest in Northern Ireland and of the extent to which issues of mutual concern arise in relation to Northern Ireland". I will not go into it in further detail apart from saying the specialness of Northern Ireland is already present in the agreement. It is not a new concept; it is already present in the agreement.

There are a number of specific elements here which are of particular importance. Security co-operation is highlighted as a specific issue. One of the most complicated issues around Brexit is the way in which Brexit is presented by those who support it as a way to bring national security by strengthening borders. I should be very clear that I am not one of those. The Good Friday Agreement operates from the exact opposite principle, which is that security is created by cross-Border co-operation and by inter-state action. The implications for security of a cross-Border-based security in the context of a strengthening Border are also of direct importance.

The more complicated elements of the agreement for inside Northern Ireland are parity of esteem and equality. It says "the power of the sovereign government with jurisdiction there [the United Kingdom] shall be exercised with rigorous impartiality on behalf of all the people in the diversity of their identities and traditions and shall be founded on the principles of full respect for, and equality of, civil, political, social and cultural rights ... and of parity of esteem and of just and equal treatment for the identity, ethos, and aspirations of both communities." In the context of Brexit and what it means in terms of aspiration, ethos and so on, there is a question about how it interacts with and is affected as a result of this.

The agreement makes explicit and direct reference to the central role of the European Convention on Human Rights but the convention remains formally untouched by this particular Act because it belongs to the Council of Europe rather than the European Union. There are political issues in the background around the future of the convention which need to be retained in mind.

May I speak for another three minutes?