Professor Edgar Morgenroth:

As regards the length of time, we are definitely looking at more than a decade. That is the experience, as I mentioned earlier, as regards German reunification. It is more likely five decades than one decade. It takes a long time to change things.

Deputy Smith is absolutely right that there are a lot of North-South benefits, and without those benefits the Border region and Northern Ireland would be much poorer than they are currently.

It would be interesting to do a study of not having these benefits, even within the current constitutional arrangement. Not having them would come at a cost, particularly to the Border area that the Deputy represents, and of course also to Northern Ireland. The Deputy is absolutely correct.

Despite those benefits, however, the Border region is a relatively poor region of the Republic of Ireland, while Northern Ireland is a poor region of the United Kingdom and relative to the Republic of Ireland also. The benefits are there but they are not sufficient to have equalised GDP or productivity. If we did not have those benefits, it would be even worse.