Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome our guests and thank them for the interest they have shown in this issue. It is without doubt the most important issue to face not only Ireland and the UK but the people of Europe in 60 years. I worry when I hear about negotiations having to take place under pressure. The danger is that a decision may be reached in desperation and it will not be the right one. Ireland and the European Union have something in common on this issue. We are intrinsically linked. If Ireland's position comes out of this badly then the European Union also comes out badly. The whole concept of the European Union could fade and diminish overnight in the event that the UK proves to be more successful outside the Union than inside. That is something that every member state and its government must keep in mind. I compliment Michel Barnier and his colleagues on the strong stance they have taken so far.

I also worry about suggestions that there should be a micro-negotiation. That should only happen after an agreement has been reached and within the parameters of that agreement. To attempt to do the opposite would undermine the whole structure of negotiation in the European Union and Michel Barnier's proposals to date as well as undermining our own position. Our friends in the UK are past masters at negotiations. They know how to negotiate. The danger is that the European Union or some member states will be stampeded into an agreement that might not be in their interests or in those of the Union.

On Northern Ireland and the Good Friday Agreement, for the past 20 years this country has traded in the Single Market as if it were one state. The success on both sides has been immeasurable. For the first time in our history, we have been able to observe at first hand the benefits of peace and the removal of borders and obstructions that reminded our people of our past, which has taken a long time to set aside and cost many lives within families and the military and also cost money. We do not want to go back there. As my colleague, Senator Richmond, stated, if we move in that direction again, there is an inevitability about where we will slide.

If an illustration is needed for the most fundamental and perfect peace process ever formed in our lifetimes, it is the European Union. For those who remember what it was like before, and I was born after the war so I do not remember before it-----