Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I fully endorse everything that Senator Chambers and Deputy Richmond have said. We really must think of a new paradigm of Irish-British relations, and that is a big job of work, but my concern now is the immediacy of the sundering of relations on 1 January next. Historically, we have had patches of poor relations but we have spent more than 20 years building the closest of relationships between our two countries. We must think about mitigating the harm of the next few months. Senator Chambers spoke about one aspect of that, namely, that 40% of our exports to the Continent transit through the UK and if there is a very significant disruption of that, it would compound our difficulties. If there is a fractious break, it will sour relations and people will start blaming other people. Fingers will be pointed and accusations made that one side did not give enough or that the other side was too intransigent and vice versa. Not only do we have to think about our relationship in the medium to longer term, we must also focus on mitigating the significant harm that can be done in the short term.