Eamon Gilmore (Dún Laoghaire, Labour) | Oireachtas source

It is my view and that of the Irish Government and the British Government that both Governments must and do have a hands-on approach to these issues. Both the Secretary of State and I were in Belfast for the concluding stages of the discussions prior to the new year. We have remained in contact. We have talked and liaised about our respective contacts with political leaderships in Northern Ireland. It is also worth bearing in mind that we now have a devolved Administration in Northern Ireland and that there is responsibility on the political parties in Northern Ireland to conclude this agreement. We are both of one mind - we have talked about this on a number of occasions - on the fact that we work together and that we also work in co-operation with the US Administration, which has been very supportive and has been in close contact with us, particularly in recent times, about what we can all do to encourage agreement among the political parties. It is important that we recognise that this requires agreement by the parties in Northern Ireland. While the governments can have all the hands-on approach that we can muster - that is the approach we intend to take - agreement must be reached by the political parties in Northern Ireland, and we will continue our efforts to do that. I will be discussing that with Theresa Villiers tomorrow.

We have spoken a number of times on the phone over the course of the past couple of weeks and we will discuss all of this when I meet her tomorrow.

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