Mr. Michael Farrell:

I will return to the question of citizenship raised by Senators Higgins and Ó Donnghaile. I raised the question of third-country nationals in Northern Ireland. I stress it again because it brings up another point, which is that sometimes the question of Irish citizenship is seen in orange and green terms and that it is a matter for people who want a united Ireland and want to be Irish citizens and vice versa. It is not as simple as that. Irish citizenship is also citizenship of the European Union. We also now have a perception in this State that it is wider than we saw it in the past. It is not a purely Gaelic Ireland and we welcome people from other countries and other cultures. It would be very helpful to the ethnic minority community in Northern Ireland to facilitate them in this and would also be a very good gesture on the part of this State towards inclusivity and trying to make slightly less controversial the question of citizenship so that it is not just seen in Unionist-Nationalist terms. That would be valuable. This leads us to think about citizenship in rather a broader way than usual.

Senator Ó Donnghaile also asked whether the Good Friday Agreement could be overturned by Brexit.

It is an international treaty and there are elements in it to which the British Government is committed and I do not believe it can overturn it. The question of who enforces it may be a different matter, but there is no legal overturning of it. Senator McDowell spoke of a hard Border and the possible repeal of the Human Rights Act and its removal from the EU Convention. The Senator does not think the British Government wants a hard Border. We cannot assume this to be the case. We must maintain the position that it should not happen and we must argue for it.