Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael)

I suppose that one of the things that causes Deputy Martin's perception of this is the actual normality that has been restored between the Assembly and the activities of the Oireachtas. I have outlined much of what has happened since the last meeting. Clearly, the impact of, for instance, the Titanic Experience has been enormous in the sense of the number of visitors flocking to Belfast. Clearly, with the performance of Graham McDowell and others, the Irish Open in Portrush will be of pretty significant importance in terms of numbers going to it.

When one looks at it, dealing with the reduction in corporation tax, for instance, is an issue that is a matter for the British Government and the Assembly. There was a discussion about that at the North-South Ministerial Council. A great deal of work has been carried out on that. There were quite a deal of discussions on health, for instance, with the opening of the new South West Acute Hospital in Enniskillen, which the Minister made perfectly clear was also open to patients from Cavan, Monaghan, Leitrim and Sligo, if necessary. As to the question of the sharing of services in Altnagelvin Area Hospital for radiotherapy, to which the State contributed, it is open to people from County Donegal and so on. The same applies in the issues that are now being discussed with the Ministers for education. There was agreement on Friday that third level education and its capacity and potential should be issues for discussion at the next meeting. Work is ongoing there between both of those Ministers.

I do not want to interfere in the work that is going on between the Ceann Comhairle and Speaker Hay in respect of the North-South parliamentary forum except to say that the Ceann Comhairle informed me formally by letter of having received a number of papers that were quite constructive in the sense of being able to set this up. I commend Speaker Hay and the Ceann Comhairle on their efforts in this. I think that will be an important element of the process, as Deputy Martin rightly pointed out, that began way back with the Good Friday Agreement.

I do not accept that there is any sense of drift. What is becoming perfectly evident is the normality of relations between the peoples of Northern Ireland and the Republic and the normal relations that are evident in the work going on between the Oireachtas, its agencies and bodies and the Northern Ireland Assembly. I have had a number of meetings with the First and Deputy First Ministers, for instance, at last Friday's meeting. Both the First and Deputy First Ministers want to go to China later on in the year. I think it will be in November. We have agreed to make available to them all of the contacts that were established following Vice President Xi Jinping's visit here and my own visit to China along with the Ministers, Deputies Bruton and Coveney. It just shows the impact of how quickly things can happen. Protocols were signed in respect of China importing pork, beef and seafood, including fresh fish, from Ireland. We want to make these connections available to the First and Deputy First Ministers and their delegation.

It is normal and working well. If there is a particular issue that Deputy Martin thinks is not receiving sufficient attention, I would be happy to follow up on it. The close relationship between the Ministers for justice, Mr. Ford and Deputy Shatter, was perfectly evident at the North-South Ministerial Council meeting last Friday. It is not usual for two Ministers for justice to attend like that, but there is a great deal of co-operation, for example, in intelligence sharing and services sharing, in respect of the issues with which they are dealing.

From that perspective, I found the meeting to be very constructive. As the Deputy First Minister said, a great deal of the issues that were set out were, in Civil Service language, dispensed with. Any difficulty that we had in respect of, for example, the A5 and A8, was very clear. We have committed to the £22 million sterling in 2015 and 2016. We are also committed to reviewing the possibility of any further financial contribution beyond that when we look at the review framework in due course.

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