Mr. Ciar?n Hartley:

The thrust of my contribution was really about the process. I agree with the previous speakers, in that we cannot enter into the process that we are discussing with any prescriptive or predefined ideas about what the outcomes will be. According to an online Ireland's Future event held in January, a journalist, Ms Aoife Moore, submitted a freedom of information request to the Department of Justice. What she found out was that no contingency plan whatsoever had been made by this Government for a border poll or eventual unification. However, it did have a contingency plan for Scottish independence. There is something fundamentally wrong with that approach. It is incumbent on the Irish Government to start detailed planning now based on evidence, academia, as many different voices as possible and expert analysis.