Mr. Francis Gallagher:

Chairman, distinguished Senators, colleagues, I really enjoyed the contributions out of everyone. I want to add to what the Senators asked in respect of what political framework will develop from all of this. I will outline briefly what I think are the three main constitutional frameworks that could be possible. One is a federation, one is a confederation and the other is a centralised state. All of those options are unitary states. The federal option delegates adequate power to the people in order that more power can be retained in the centre. The confederal state is the most democratic option because it considers the people as totally sovereign. The best example would be Switzerland, where there is direct democracy. For example, I come from the area around the Mourne Mountains. If the powers that be are going to take away Newcastle's or Downpatrick's local hospital, through direct democracy, the local people can go out into their village square, vote on it and say "We want to keep our local hospital". The confederal constitution is the most democratic. The Irish Republic is a centralised state because most of the political power is in Dublin, although there are the local democracies. I am here to advocate for a confederal democracy. I encourage people to look at Switzerland as an inspiration for that.

The other point I would like to make is about identity. Identity is extremely important, but there is also another concept that is very important and that is accountability. I have lived all my life in Northern Ireland, or the North, whichever way you want to term it, and what I perceive as the major problem - we are not supposed to speak about entities here, so I will keep it more general - with the governmental system in the North is that it is based too much around identity rather than accountability. This institutionalises, or is inclined to institutionalise, sectarianism. If we are going to build a new Ireland, we have to try to forge a new consensus for a new Ireland. That means drawing up a completely new constitution for the whole island. It is highly unlikely at this stage that a considerable number of unionist people would not take part in any debate on that. If that debate was initially around reforming the institutions in the North of Ireland, maybe more might take part.

One point about citizens' conventions, I advocate that those meet in each town where consensus is measured and everyone is given a say. A select citizens' assembly is okay, but how do you select those people? What is their expertise? What about all the people who have not had a say? Measuring consensus is also very important.