Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Brexit creates, in some ways, an impetus for us to increase our presence around the world to become less reliant on UK markets. Even if there were no Brexit, we should be doing it anyway as there is a big world out there, which is much larger than Britain and Europe. We are working across Departments on joined-up policy-making to develop what we are calling "Global Ireland 2025". I have the latest draft in my briefcase but I have not had the time to read the bloody thing yet. Hopefully, I will get around to that over the Easter break. In essence, our plan over the next seven years to 2025 is to increase very substantially our presence around the world by beefing up existing diplomatic missions, opening new ones and expanding the roles of the IDA, Enterprise Ireland and Bord Bia. It also means doing things in the arts and culture space.

For so many people around the world, their first glimpse of Ireland is through the arts, our literature and language. One of the things I got to do in New York which I was delighted to do was increase our funding for the Irish Arts Centre. I would love to see a number of Irish arts centres around the world. The Deputy will know from working with Mercyhurst University and others the value of education exchanges, of which I would like to see more. It is part of the philosophy I am trying to bring to government, of taking the objective first - to increase our footprint around the world - and then building our policy behind it, not with just one Department but with several Departments and agencies implementing it, and communicating it in a singular way.