Pat Rabbitte (Dublin South West, Labour)

It is disappointing that the Good Friday Agreement has not led to the strengthening of the political centre in Northern Ireland as many people had hoped, and that the principal political beneficiaries appear to have been the parties of the extreme. We owe a great debt of gratitude to parties like the SDLP and the Ulster Unionist Party, which kept the process alive through the many dark days since 1998.

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