Dr. Kieran McQuinn:

That was about the outcome of the trade deal with the UK and the EU. To echo the points we made earlier, it is very difficult to see a free trade agreement being signed within 12 months. As Dr. Lawless outlined in the opening statement, given the preponderance of trade deals of such magnitude that have been done, it is very difficult to see it. As a result, given that there is likely to be a lot of difficulties in any trade negotiations which take place, uncertainty is going to be a continued feature in the Irish economic landscape going into 2020. As we said earlier, even though the economy has performed very strongly over the last years, there is no doubt that uncertainty around the Brexit issue has impacted adversely on consumer sentiment, investor sentiment and so on. If we continue to see that kind of uncertainty about the Brexit outcome, the danger is that it will continue to weigh down and have a negative impact on the economy. As the economy slows down, as it inevitably will in the years to come because it cannot keep growing at the present rate, the negative impact of that uncertainty may become more apparent. More generally, as others have discussed, if we have a free trade agreement or negotiations, the potential for disruptions across the European Union could be quite significant in terms of any negotiations with the UK. There could be a scenario where countries are being pitted against each other in terms of the conditions and negotiations that take place. There could also be tensions within countries. For example, if there is a deal on the table that is well disposed towards our agricultural sector but not as well disposed towards, for instance, our fisher people, how are we going to react to that? There is going to be a large amount of uncertainty in these negotiations. Unfortunately, I think it is something that will run for quite some time.