Mr. Niall Cody:

When we spoke here in May or June of 2017 we talked about presentation of documents and we were at an early stage of thinking about how some of that will work. We have had some significant engagement with customs agents and brokers. There was a really good session in the first week of January with customs agents or brokers who facilitate international trade but are not engaged in customs entries, because there have not been customs entries to the same extent for the past few years, who are considering how to get back into that marketplace. We are looking at the idea that goods entries will be presented online, not at Revenue offices. The whole process will be an online service. The customs clearance agent will step in to deal with the 45,000 small traders who have occasional import transactions. The most efficient way to deliver that service is to work through a customs clearance agent. The Deputy is right, however, that will cost money. There is an administrative burden in complying with customs formalities. There is an administrative burden brought about by the UK leaving the customs union and the Single Market.

Regardless of any other implications of Brexit, there will be an administrative burden on businesses that import goods from or export goods to the UK. That is a consequence of the UK not being in the Single Market and the customs union. My counterpart in the UK got beaten up, so to speak, by Brexiteers for trying to put a cost on that in respect of the number of transactions. It is very complicated for a number of the logistics companies and the business model where a load for multi-consignees is brought in. We try to provide a framework, facilities and ICT infrastructure to facilitate the free movement. We could go away from this meeting saying that Niall Cody said it will be all right. It will be a significant cost implication for businesses engaged in trade and depending on the sector even more so, and by the time we finish today we will talk about various sectors, for example, the agrifood sector.

I can tell the Deputy and his constituents that we are not involved in the cleaning up of any facilities for Border posts. There have been a number of questions, and I hear about Border posts being done up for Revenue. I did not even know that that work was done in those locations. Some of the locations are owned by the State, some are not and some of the original ones are gone. Where they are State-owned, I imagine at various times insurance, health and safety and many other issues will probably have to be looked after by the Office of Public Works, OPW.

We have been involved heavily in work on the physical infrastructural arrangements that are needed in the ports. They are significant, and they will involve expenditure. We do not have the facility to have secret funds and secret expenditure; it has to be voted. The Deputy's colleagues on the committee which is meeting next door would have great fun with me if I had magic resources. I assure him that no work is being done on Bridgend. We still have an office and staff in Bridgend. Around the time I was before the committee previously, I was in the offices in Letterkenny and Bridgend and the principal officer in Donegal at the time brought me out to show me the location of the original Bridgend customs post. It was a lovely sunny day but I said we had better get back into the car because it would have been a very interesting photograph in the newspaper of the chairman of the Revenue Commissioners surveying new posts. The Deputy might even have come in and told me I was seen up there. I assure him we are not planning in that regard.

On the discussions that will have to take place with the Commission, they are conversations that would have to take place. When they take place, all of us will be caught up in the negotiations about what is happening, which are led by the Departments of Foreign Affairs and Trade and the Taoiseach. We provide technical support. The issue so far is that there is a withdrawal agreement agreed by the EU and adopted by the 27 countries. It was agreed originally with the UK Government, and there is a process to be gone through in that respect. We will provide whatever support is necessary when and if negotiations have to move to that phase. I could not possibly speculate about what it is that would have to be done but there are certain clear principles that flow from being a member of the customs union and being in the Single Market. When Britain leaves, it will leave from being in a position that it is in the customs union and in the Single Market and there is regulatory alignment at the start.