Mr. Brian Gormally:

Paragraph 52 of the EU-UK joint report on the first phase of the negotiations, which was agreed in December 2017, made it clear that the arrangements necessary to give Irish citizens, including those who reside in Northern Ireland, as many rights of EU citizenship as possible - it did not define which rights were envisaged - would be discussed in the next phase.

The withdrawal agreement, or the draft one that is extant at the minute, does not mention those required arrangements. That was a failure in negotiation by the commission and, perhaps, the Irish Government. At this time, beyond the basics that a person can exercise freedom of movement within the EU, he or she can also have representation by consul from other EU nations if that person is in a third country somewhere, and he or she can petition institutions of the European Union. Those are the basic rights that are laid down in the treaty for the operation of the European Union - the Maastricht Treaty. There are many other rights that accrue from living in an EU member state. It is those rights, in principle, that will be lost by Brexit and we thought there was a commitment to find creative ways to honour those rights.