Mr. Mark Durkan:

The North-South provisions agreed in 1998 ended up being necessarily limited because of reactions to the text at the time. People were on the defensive because they had objected to what had been envisaged in the framework document in 1995 and that, perhaps, shopsoiled some of the ideas for North-South arrangements. While what was agreed in 1998 and regarding which implementation bodies and areas of co-operation would be legislated for, to happen on day one alongside devolution, they were all open to further development. That could be development of their own remits, their remits being complemented by other areas of co-operation being agreed or by other implementation bodies and so on. We have not really had that since unionist parties have taken a "keep it low, keep it slow" approach as far as North-South engagement is concerned.

When we negotiated the agreement, as well as the civic forum in the North, it was cast that there could be a North-South consultative forum as well. The idea of that was to try to ensure that positive ideas for North-South co-operation, policy co-ordination and deepening or widening areas of co-operation would come not necessarily as party political demands but as very credible sectoral ambitions and initiatives. The test unionists in particular have is whether something is a real issue and if it will be of mutual benefit and collective interest. That test would almost be proven by who was coming forward with many of these ideas and proposals as they would be coming from the sectors themselves. Unfortunately we do not have that. I hope that in any renewal or review of the agreement, we could get back to those sorts of intents because not everything has to come from political parties or through political processes. We see examples of that in a lot of the debate around the protocol and some of the options for moving there.

There was also meant to be a North-South parliamentary forum. The engagement between the Assembly and these Houses is done in a very stilted way and it could be done much more organically. In any renewal or review, rather than us just getting fixated on the feng shui of changing a bit of the furniture in the NSMC, we should look to that dimension as well because positive ideas and engagement can come from that. A more intentional North-South parliamentary forum could provide the space for the sort of engagement Senator Ó Donnghaile was talking about earlier, with MLAs, Senators and Deputies being able to sit down and talk about different issues or how to advance policies. We need to come into this with lateral thinking. We should also recognise that even on a vexed issue like the protocol, Article 14(b) of the protocol actually states that the North-South Ministerial Council and-or the implementation bodies could put forward proposals to the specialised committee.

InterTradeIreland's remit could easily be repointed so that, if the EU and UK Government are discussing a trusted trader scheme, there could be a role for it in overseeing and vouching for that scheme. In terms of co-operation on agriculture and animal health, the food safety advisory body's bandwidth could be widened to deal with some of the issues that obtain post protocol, post Brexit or whatever the case may be. We just have to come at this situation creatively. We do not want to jeopardise what we agreed in 1998, but we should not be so defensive as to not build it up. As has been mentioned, we are more than 24 years on and there are different policy issues pressing, some of which entail international obligations and standards. We should be looking to how North-South and east-west arrangements can address some of those difficulties.