Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)

The Government has a firm view. It is better to deal with that issue first, as the Deputy's letter suggested. If that is not possible, it means the EU referendum will be held alone. We were considering whether we could include the comprehensive children's issue as part of the EU referendum but it is not possible. I understand there is too much work and it is just not possible to have it ready, whether we hold the referendum in June or September. That is out of the equation. We need to resolve whether it is possible to include the decoupled issue and to get all-party agreement on it. I hope we can do that fairly quickly.

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