Mr. Colin McGrath:

I thank the Deputy. His remarks highlight the complexity of the whole Brexit process. There are so many issues in there. As regards the ability for our committees to meet regularly and to set out a schedule for doing so, we are certainly very open to that. We have had several meetings with various committees and we agree that we benefit from those discussions. I always believe that if you meet, then you are talking and when you are talking, you discuss problems and in that discussion you find solutions. That kind of dovetails across the other areas, such as certain Ministers not attending North-South Ministerial Council. If you are not there and you are not talking, you are not going to find solutions. I believe it negates the ability of a Minister to stand up and say there are problems if he or she has not taken the opportunity to go and find the solutions. Banging the drum is the easy thing for any person elected to public office to do but actually going, doing the hard yards, getting results and solutions and delivering for people are the most important things.

In terms of the two committees meeting, we will meet any committee we need to meet. There are a number of committees, several within Dublin and several others within the assembly. There are inputs from London, Edinburgh and Cardiff too that are important. That leads me back to my response on BIPA. It is about trying to find a forum wherein all of the voices, on a formal basis, can have input and discussions.

I was struck by Deputy Richmond's point that events and discussions at forums such at BIPA are important to the voice of MLAs in the North being heard. During the three years when there was no assembly, BIPA continued to meet twice a year and that provided me and representatives of all of the parties with six two-day events at which to articulate our thoughts and views on Brexit and to make our views and concerns known to other elected representatives across the islands. It is important, in the absence of something more formal between the EU and the North, that we maximise the opportunities to come together to have voices heard. We should continue to strive for that. For as long as an EU-North forum is not available, we should maximise the other opportunities for meeting.

On the protocol, the non-attendance by some unionist representatives and Ministers at the North-South Ministerial Council is a symptom of an unworkable protocol. We have to regularly remind them in committee that the protocol is a symptom of Brexit, for which only a minority of people in the North voted, but it is being imposed on all of us. The protocol is very much a symptom of Brexit, but if we take the practical approach of identifying that there are problems and issues then we have to find solutions. People going back into communities and burying their heads in the sand, as happened in the past in some places, will not provide solutions for people.

In terms of the main issues, we need to be careful when we talk about the problems relating to the protocol. There are issues but the nature or number of issues sometimes get talked up a lot more. People continually say that there are problems, but when they are asked to identify them, the response always is simply that there are problems. Many of the sectors in the North with which we meet on a regular basis in committee, and separately as representatives, are quick to highlight a couple of the key issues for them, but they also come to table with solutions. It appears that the majority of the problems that have hit as a result of the protocol arose because businesses in GB were unprepared. Businesses in the North had been told that forms would need to be filled in and that certain channels would need to be sorted out. Business is very flexible. It will always try to do its best to work through issues. Businesses in the North have done that.

From an west-east point of view, I do not anticipate there will be major or significant problems, but there are major and significant problems coming the other way and that can cause logistical difficulties. In terms of transportation, for example, fully-loaded lorries going to England without the correct paperwork will not be filled up for the return journey. That can cause logistical concerns and issues. At the root of that is the fact that many of the businesses in GB were not prepared and we then started to hear them saying that if the process was going to be very complex and there were not going to be offered a lot of help, they just would not bother with it. There has been some interaction with businesses to help them understand that the process is not that complicated once they get over the first round of work, but further work needs to be done. Grace periods are still in operation. Should they stop at a cliff edge, as has happened in various other areas of the Brexit process, that may lead to significant problems very quickly. There is need for an assessment by the Governments of the grace periods and what will happen when they expire and to then put in place measures to deal with that.