Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

On legacy, I was in the Seanad yesterday and we had a good debate on legacy and reconciliation. I thought the debate had some depth. Members of different political parties gave different perspectives. I thought we need to have more of the approach taken to that debate on the issue of legacy and reconciliation to ensure that victims and their families from all sides and all communities can get the truth they seek and, if it is possible, the justice for that.

We are active on both the reconciliation and legacy agenda working with the British Government but also passing our own legislation. For example, the families of the Kingsmill victims will have concerns about accusations of collusion on this side of the Border and they want questions asked and answered. We are in the process of passing legislation being brought forward by the Minister for Justice and Equality, Deputy Flanagan, to allow for inquests that are taking place in Northern Ireland to have hearings in a court in Dublin where a member of An Garda Síochána could give evidence or answer questions, if that was appropriate to do, in the context of some of the legacy inquests currently happening or may happen in the future. That involves both Governments passing new legislation. We will insist on the full suite of measures and commitments that were committed to in the Stormont House Agreement and we need legislation passed in Westminster to make that happen. We will continue to advocate for that.

There are other cases as well, including the Dublin-Monaghan bombings, on which the Government continues to have a clear perspective and this is consistent with motions passed in the Dáil and the Seanad. We will continue to advocate accordingly. Some of the recent decisions relating to Bloody Sunday and so on heighten the focus on legacy. I also refer to the Ballymurphy killing. We are very much in tune with that and are part of that debate. I hope we can achieve the kind of language but also the structures we need to be able to move many of these processes forward.

On new missions, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade has never expanded at the pace we are expanding at right now. As I said earlier, new embassies are opening in Bogota, Colombia and Santiago, Chile. I am glad a new embassy has opened in Wellington, considering what happened in recent weeks in New Zealand, about which Ireland wants to show as much solidarity as it can. There is a new mission in Vancouver for the obvious reasons. It is physically so far away from the embassy in eastern Canada and that there is a strong Irish community in Vancouver. We are opening a new embassy in Amman, Jordan, because Ireland is taking an increasing political interest in the Middle East peace process and also funnelling a lot of aid money into many of the humanitarian operations across the Middle East in respect of Syrian refugees and so on.

I have outlined the position on Vancouver, Wellington, Santiago, Bogota, Mumbai, Amman, Cardiff, Frankfurt and Los Angeles in terms of what has happened in the past six months and what will happen in the coming six months.

We are also going beyond that. We have committed to opening a new embassy in Morocco and in Kiev in Ukraine. We are also opening an embassy in Liberia and will probably increase our presence further in west Africa. We can only do this at a pace that allows us to do it efficiently and cost effectively. Increased staff numbers are needed as well. I think we are doing this as quickly as we can and targeting the right places. I refer to both political and economic interests.

The EU already has trade agreements in place with most of the countries where we are investing. For example, we will be investing very heavily in capital infrastructure in Tokyo. We are building a new Ireland House there. That will be the biggest capital expenditure ever in a facility like this. It is not a coincidence that the EU has just signed a trade deal with Japan. Likewise, we have increased our emphasis on Canada because the EU has a trade agreement in place, as it has also with both Chile and Colombia. This is Ireland growing and expanding globally. We will continue to do that, but the process needs to be planned and structured. There needs to be a proper strategy and thought process behind it.

Finally, regarding A Better World, the Minister of State, Deputy Cannon, and I agree on this. One of the things both of us really wanted to do while in this Department was to modernise our approach to development. It is already good but we can take it to a new level. We deliberately made that policy document a relatively short read, but there is much significant content. There is also a major financial commitment behind it. I hope future Governments will honour that because it is going to put great pressure on whatever parties are in government over the next ten years to find an increase of more than €100 million each year for our development strategy. It is a big ask. I hope we will be able maintain an economy that can fund it. That is, however, where we are going. The Minister of State, Deputy Cannon, will speak more about that later.