Paul Daly (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the delegation and thank it for the report. There is no point in me going over old water. We all know how unique this situation is and how precarious the negotiations are. In a nutshell, the words "Nobody knows" encapsulates it. With that in mind, I will tease out further a few items in the report and I will ask for some indications.

I appreciate that in this situation we must prepare for every possible outcome. With regard to preparedness, the officials seemed to focus their presentation on budgetary allocations.

I am not being critical but want to tease things out further. The one budget allocation of which I am very aware is the 2018 low-interest Brexit preparedness loan but we have now learned that the first funds will not be drawn down until January 2019, only two months before the Brexit date. What is the position with regard to the other budgetary expenditure areas? If they are all in the same boat as that one, we are not going to be prepared. I ask the witnesses to outline the Department's preparedness vis-à-vistime rather than budgetary allocations or aspirational preparations. How close are we to being ready to face whatever meets us at the end of March, particularly with regard to the possibility of a hard Brexit?

The witnesses have referred to the losses that might be incurred by our fishermen in the event of a hard Brexit and an inability to access British waters. At the same time, fishermen in the UK would lose their access to the greater European waters. How are we preparing for that, in terms of policing our own waters, for example? Has much thought or preparation been put into that?

A lot of emphasis is being put on sourcing new markets as a way of getting us over the bridge. Food Wise 2025 makes reference to increasing our exports by 50% from their 2017 levels but we will have to source a lot of additional markets to achieve that, even without Brexit. How much work has been done on finding new markets because we would need to travel the world over to achieve the Food Wise targets, apart altogether from Brexit?

We are preparing for the worst while hoping for the best. If we do get the best, namely a soft or good Brexit with which the Department and the agriculture sector is happy, if world markets do not read it as a good Brexit for Britain and the British economy and sterling takes another nosedive that will have a devastating effect in terms of us trying to hold onto our British markets. Have preparations been made for that possibility?