Jennifer Carroll MacNeill (Dún Laoghaire, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Chair. This has been a helpful session with excellent to and fro. I have three questions. I refer to what Dr. Kenny said about the referendums being freely and concurrently given and the question of whether they are contemporaneous or otherwise. Contemporaneous referendums might be desirable as an idea, but what do we do legally and politically if there are different outcomes?

This report reference refers to the 1973 border poll and the boycott of that poll by unionists. How do we view the legitimacy of a poll in Northern Ireland in similar circumstances now, knowing what we know since the Good Friday Agreement? Going back to Article 3 of the Constitution, and this is for Dr. Kenny in particular, it seems to me that the obligation has always been for the Irish nation to "unite all the people who share the territory". Taking into account what we know of the drafting of the Constitution, the wording that legislators used and the choice of wording that could have been used, there is a question in Irish politics at the moment concerning the existence of an obligation to work towards a united Ireland as a territory, as opposed to an equally legitimate aspiration of working towards the unity of people. How does Dr. Kenny interpret Article 3.1 in respect of priority? Does he regard one perspective as trumping the other or as elements having equal weight?