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

I thank the Tánaiste for his reply and fully appreciate the effort he has made to date. It is welcome that he will be in Washington next month. There have been a number of developments which seem to give some optimism that progress will be made. The Speaker, Mr. Boehner, was recently quoted as stating progress could be made with the Democrats through building goodwill on several unrelated legislative measures. I hope this can be achieved. The New York Timeshas reported that bipartisan moves between the two sides mean that Democrats in the Senate are seeking Bills unrelated to the immigration issue which they can pass to build goodwill between Republicans and Democrats. It is significant that 250 senior Christian pastors went to Congress to lobby their representatives. The intervention and involvement of senior CEOs of major corporations and chambers of commerce are new dimensions supporting the work done by various lobby groups duing the years. Is the Tánaiste more optimistic now than he was a number of weeks ago about the likelihood of progress being made in the House of Representatives?

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