Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister for his reply. I welcome the particular phraseology he used towards the end of his contribution when he said there is an expectation of delivery. We hope that can be achieved. My one concern, which I have reiterated in this House on numerous occasions, is that there does not seem to be the urgency attached to these talks that there needs to be. We missed the end of year deadline. St. Patrick's week should have been another milestone to try to reach conclusions. We are now into the European and local elections phase. After the end of May we will be into the parading season. None of those times is conducive to making progress on some contentious political issues. It is time for both Governments to take a more hands-on approach to these very important issues.

We must remember that both sovereign Governments are co-guarantors of the Good Friday Agreement. We need to see progress on the issues concerning our entire island, be it the Downing Street Declaration, the Good Friday Agreement or the St. Andrews Agreement, all of which were driven very much by the leadership of both sovereign Governments. The issues to be concluded in the Haass talks are of extreme importance as well.

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