Ms Sinéad Gibney:

I agree that it is hard to remember the time pre-Covid when Brexit was so dominant. Ms McGahey mentioned the event we held last week which heard from Border communities and community groups which work across the Border. My recommendation to the committee would be that it should take note of the experiences of those communities which are living on the Border. I do not think we have yet seen the impact of Brexit in the daily routine of people's lives and how that has been impacted by Brexit. We heard in that very powerful session from rural women's groups, for example, about already having to juggle two systems in the locations they are in and the psychological toll that takes as well as the practical toll of organising your life around these two systems that you straddle in your life. That is heavily exacerbated by Brexit. They spoke of concepts like border-proofing and rural-proofing, how communities in Border regions are already far from services and that Brexit will have an additional impact on access to services. Border-proofing and rural-proofing the work of Government are things the committee should take into account of into the future.

I referenced a series of papers which the joint committee worked on coming up to Brexit in which we examined specific issues around political participation in the North for EU citizens and the birthright issues around the DeSouza case. Rather than go into detail now, I am happy to share links with members with specific recommendations which the committee can take into account. Mr. Allamby and Ms McGahey will have some more comments to add. Perhaps Ms McGahey might like to speak on women's rights issues.