Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour)

I understand that there may be a good case for this, particularly in the context of both States being outside of Schengen. Is the logic of that not the creation of an external border around both islands and the exercise of those controls on people originating from places outside the two islands? Why does it require that people from the Republic of Ireland will have to produce passports on entering the UK when people travelling from Northern Ireland will not have to do so? I do not understand that. Rapists and terrorists, all the people one wishes to pick up through this system, are surely smart enough to know that if they travel through Belfast they will not be caught. What is the point of applying it between the island of Britain and the Republic of Ireland but not in Northern Ireland? It does not make sense. I would understand if it was applied on the external borders of the two islands and then have a system of free travel — as we have had — within the two islands.

See this speech in context