Neale Richmond (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank Mr. Keohane as usually I am the one who is accused of depressing people when describing future relationships. He has outlined a number of very clear challenges in a stark and welcome way. It feeds into much of the work we are doing.

What policy should we be initiating or where is the scope to initiate particular policies? The term "investing in relations" is great. One of the great achievements of this and the previous Government is that during the austerity years we maintained the diplomatic network throughout the European Union. The strengthening of the Permanent Representation in Brussels is most welcome. Beyond this, how can we specifically invest in developing relations? It is evident that we have seen a great deal of solidarity. This morning I met a delegation from the Bundestag. Are we taking that solidarity for granted and how far will it get us if, ideally, we move to the second phase and speak about future relations after Brexit, or if we face the more likely challenge presented by a no-deal scenario?

I have some country-specific questions. It is interesting that the Danish and Portuguese Parliaments sent delegations to us recently from their European affairs and Brexit committees. I acknowledge everything Mr. Keohane noted. I do not want to pick at matters as we have a great relationship with both countries. The obvious challenge in deepening relations with Portugal, in particular, is presented by the language barrier. As we know, Irish people do not have a great ability to speak a second or third language and there is a particular weakness when it comes to speaking languages like Portuguese. We may have French or German speakers, but barring a few of my friends who are married to people from Portugal or Brazil, if I am honest, I do not know anybody who can speak Portuguese. How can we work on this or improve matters in that regard? How can it be removed as an obstacle to developing that strategic alliance?

With the Danes, it is a far more political point. I do not expect Ms O'Connell and Mr. Keohane to go into the politics of Denmark too much but there is in Denmark, as in the United Kingdom, a lingering Euroscepticism. We see that reflected in the recent election results. While the Social Democrats have come back into power in Denmark, it is a very different social democratic party from, for instance, the social democratic parties in southern Europe or elsewhere where migration has been a much bigger factor. Indeed, while we have great commonalities with the Danes and very warm relationships, are there areas, especially in agriculture where we are perhaps more competitors than allies, and how do we get over that and make sure that we get the most out of that strategic alliance?

The French and German alliance was mentioned. I fundamentally believe that we need to maintain the strength of our relationship, and if everyone is looking to improve that alliance, so be it. The Franco-German alliance will dominate the EU post Brexit more than it has in a long time. That is merely a fact of life. We are lucky that we have such a strong relationship with those two member states at diplomatic, political and parliamentary levels. I would always have seen a strong relationship, definitely at a political and governmental level but also at an internal political level, with the Benelux countries. To be party political, when I attended meetings on behalf of Fine Gael or Young Fine Gael, our natural allies were always the Christian Democrats from the Benelux region. It is literally who we sat beside for dinner. We were able to work together on a range of common motions on what we believed Europe to be in terms of a Union of values and law and order, as well as an economic Union and a social Union. I note that the Dutch royals are visiting Ireland at present and I am lucky to be attending the event with however many others tomorrow evening. They met the President today. I still think those are two relationships on which, going back to my earlier point, we cannot take anything for granted in terms of solidarity. We also cannot take for granted the relationships with the Germans, French, Dutch, Belgians or any of our European partners, because I would maintain we have very good relationships with all the other 26 and the United Kingdom as a departing member state.