Mr. Bertie Ahern:

I have been saying for a number of years - probably before many people - that I thought that looking for an early border poll was the wrong thing to do. Everyone has now moved away from that. I agree with Mr. Brady that the work has to be done. It has now commenced. There is some good work being done academically. I know of at least three universities that are working their way through the question of how to bring a new Ireland together and how we would deal with the legislation. That is good. Much of the work is focusing on administration as well as on legislation relating to security and so on. Nothing is being done on the economic side yet, but I have learned this week that such work is to commence at one of the universities in the new year. There will be North-South collaboration on that. It is currently trying to pull together the resources to do that work. This is good and important. It is good that such work is being done academically because the universities have no axe to grind. They are doing the work professionally and in an academic way, and it will be used by everyone.

As the Scottish referendum proved, any of the SNP people you might talk to will readily admit privately if not publicly - I believe they admit it publicly as well, though - that, while the SNP got a great deal right, it did not address finances. At that point, the SNP was up against Gordon Brown and the then Chancellor of the Exchequer, Mr. Alistair Darling.

It was buried on that issue and probably lost the referendum because of it. The financing end is not the only issue. There are whole lot of questions, such as how we would bring An Garda Síochána and the PSNI together, and how we would bring together the courts, local authorities, and the National Health Service and the HSE. These are all big questions but they are doable with work, preparation and planning. Otherwise, and not everyone agrees with this but I was asked for my view, if we hold a referendum while saying we do not know how we will deal with the National Health Service between the North and the South or how we will bring An Garda or the courts together, I will tell you now what the result would be and I will not charge anything for the advice; it will not have a hope in hell of passing. There are some people who think that it would. I do not because we would have a debate, we would be here debating it and people would see after a few days that it is illogical to do that.

I readily admit that the citizens' assembly has probably sorted out some thorny issues in this country in the past decade. Would I like to see a citizens' assembly of 100 people? I was before the citizens' assembly recently talking about an elected mayor for Dublin. I enjoyed the morning with those present and we had lovely tea and all that. I do not think we solved much but we will see what happens. I am not too sure about putting the national question we have been talking about for 100 years into the hands of 100 people. If I was one of the 100 I might have a different view, but I am not sure I want to hand that over. It should be debated within political parties and civil society, and at the annual conferences of all the organisations, but I am not too sure about handing that over to just 100 people and a chairman. I am not saying, "No way". Maybe when all the work is done, then we could hand it over to somebody. Personally, I would like to see Dáil Éireann having a role in that. I would like to think that the people we go to the trouble of electing will have a big say.