Seán Haughey (Dublin Bay North, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State for his attendance this morning.

On Brexit, other speakers have drawn attention to issues in their own areas and I am interested to see a report by Transport Infrastructure Ireland as it has concerns about the situation in Dublin Port with trucks arriving from the United Kingdom. The TII has asked Irish Ferries and Stena Line to stagger their arrival times but without much success. The suggestion is that there will be a major snarl up of traffic in the Dublin Port tunnel, the M50 and the surrounding road networks, including motorways. That would be an issue of concern. Stena Line has raised concerns about the location of checkpoints in Dublin Port. I note that Transport Infrastructure Ireland has set up a committee, a traffic management group, to consider the issue. I appreciate that this is a matter for the Department of Transport but I say to the Minister of State that this is a crucial issue. There is nothing surer that the citizens of Dublin will be very upset if the traffic is snarled up from day one because of the position in Dublin Port. That is something we need to look at seriously at this stage and prevent any problems arising.

I note what the Minister of State said about treaty change. I support his view that the Government does not favour treaty change. As he will have heard, this committee has discussed the Conference on the Future of Europe for several weeks with various points of view brought forward. Some Members have suggested that we do not need treaty change, that we could exploit the existing treaties, including the Lisbon treaty. In that regard, the issue of public health has certainly come on the agenda in the last year. Does he see scope for public health becoming a competency of the European Union or is it a question of co-ordinating existing policies?

On consulting the citizens here in Ireland, the Minister of State made reference to citizens' assemblies and dialogues. We are familiar with the citizens' dialogues that took place in 2018 and 2019. They were organised by European Movement Ireland whose representatives have been before this committee to say how that worked. Has he firmed up on how he wishes to consult with the citizens here in Ireland? Obviously consultation with and engagement by citizens is really important. Does he envisage something similar to 2018 and 2019 where citizens' dialogues were used or has he other ideas in mind? When will he make a decision on that? Will he wait for the formal structure to be put in place or is he giving consideration to that at this time?

Several speakers have raised the issue of common values and the rule of law so I will not go into that. I will make a final point about something that the Minister of State said in his last contribution on alliances across the European Union. I think he said that Ireland is part of informal alliances for fishing. Can he please give more detail on what alliances, informal or otherwise, we are involved in within the European Union? What issues have we come together on with other EU states? Presumably, agriculture is another one and the protection of the Common Agricultural Policy, CAP. I know that it is all very informal and he will not be quoted by other EU states about formal alliances and so forth. I am interested in hearing his views because the UK is leaving the European Union, which is a big loss from the point of view of an ally for several issues. What alliances does he see Ireland, as a nation State, becoming informally involved in? What are the issues in that regard?