Professor Colin Harvey:

That is a great question. It is one of the challenges as we know with the Good Friday Agreement, the multi-party agreement and the bilateral international treaty. To cut a very long story short, as a matter of international law there is very little that the Irish Government can do to remedy this situation. Dispute resolution is one of the weaknesses in the British-Irish Agreement, and it is one of the things I mentioned earlier. The lesson has been learned in relation to the discussions around the withdrawal agreement and the protocol, that there are things that can be done, so it is a big problem. As the Deputy will know, the British constitutional legal system is still very much anchored around this concept of parliamentary supremacy. It is a dualist legal system, which means that unless and until an international legal text is translated into the domestic legal system - it is more complicated than that but that is a summary - then effectively for individuals there is very little they can do to enforce those rights.

What we have here is a concrete example of where a binding international bilateral treaty has not been effectively implemented in domestic law, policy, and practice in the UK. It is one of the big problems with the UK system, that one can reach what one thinks is a political agreement. One can even agree an international treaty with the UK, and there are obligations around good faith interpretation, but if that international agreement does not have an effective system for resolving disputes, then individuals are very reliant on what happens in domestic law, policy and practice.

For me and for many people, as we said today, the problem here is an implementation gap. It has not been reflected, but it is not the only concept from the agreement that is not reflected in British domestic law, policy and practice. One problem that I have, among many, at the moment is that on issues such as parity of esteem, mutual respect, equality of treatment between British and Irish citizens, as well as some of the human rights and equality issues I have mentioned, there is a yawning implementation gap. Until that is addressed effectively one is not going to get any form of sustainable power-sharing operating in the North, because that level playing field will not be there. One cannot have a situation where one has a bits and pieces approach to implementing the agreement. I am giving the Deputy a very long answer to the question-----