Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

There has been very little movement on the North-South strand. Additional avenues could be pursued, new bodies could be established and the range of projects usefully addressed by the existing bodies could be broadened. Enterprise is one area that springs to mind. There could be significant gains through Enterprise Ireland and Invest Northern Ireland. I recall initiating the first initiative that ensured Northern Ireland companies could go on trade missions overseas with Enterprise Ireland and vice versa. That has been added to by the Minister, Deputy Bruton. While I welcome that, we could go further. There is no reason we could not have a single all-Ireland enterprise agency to deal with indigenous companies. Foreign direct investment is a different kettle of fish.

I am aware of the realities referred to by Deputy Adams. There has always been a strand within unionism that has been very negative towards what might be called "North-Southery", or anything that involves an Irish dimension. Equally, all of us who have been involved over time know that a lot of politics has been played in Northern Ireland. As Deputy Adams said, everyone can play politics. It is a fact that parties go to Governments. This Government's predecessor was put under pressure to get involved in X and do Y. The issue of parades is a classic example in this respect. I always recollect that both parties swore blind to the two Governments - to Gordon Brown, to Brian Cowen and to me - that they would use their point men to sort the parades. When they left Hillsborough, they told us not to worry about the issue. Both parties and the British Government were resiling from the independent Parades Commission for some reason at the time. The commission called a lot of it right from its inception, when it had strong personnel on board, a clear mandate and the backing of both Governments. Sometimes an independent body like that is the best and most effective way to resolve issues of this nature.

There is a great deal of suspicion about what is happening on the budgetary front. The huge subsidy that is coming from the British Government is a reality. It is asserted that certain key policy personnel within Sinn Féin in areas like employment actions were moved to one side. I read recently that the people in charge of the policy on the welfare front had come up with an agreement, only for it to be shelved. That is fuelling suspicion on the Unionist side. We cannot say we are totally innocent and the other side, if we want to use that perspective, is entirely to blame. I do not think that would be a fair analysis. Sinn Féin has taken decisions - for example, its education Minister has closed 125 rural schools - but it does not seem to want to take decisions on welfare within Northern Ireland. Sinn Féin might argue that such decisions would involve dismantling the welfare state, but I am not sure that would be entirely true. There are significant issues with how the budget from Westminster is allocated and structured. There has always been a heavy security dimension to that. Perhaps this could be revisited. One would suspect that there would be a political rationale for that as well. There are questions about how the budget is allocated and the various areas are given priority. At the end of the day, if an Executive is established and an Assembly is formed, it has to take decisions.

There are moves afoot to undermine the power-sharing arrangement. We need to examine them very carefully. There is a rather simplistic view that one could move straight to a majority-minority scenario. The Executive could be improved, for example, by providing for memorandums to flow far more freely between Ministers. There is too much concentration on the offices of the First Minister and Deputy First Minister, to the detriment of other Ministers who feel alienated. I refer particularly to Ministers from other parties. I am not playing politics when I say this. If one speaks to Ministers from other parties, they will say they are out of the loop on key issues more often than not. They do not get called in until the two larger parties have made a decision. They are presented with a fait accompliat that stage. That is what is said. I always remember being told that no one would talk to David Ford when he was being touted as the forthcoming justice Minister. The DUP and Sinn Féin had decided during their negotiations on various issues that an Alliance person would be the Minister. When I met David Ford, he told me that no one had spoken to him about it. A little straight talking is needed here. It is not a one-way street. In a multi-party arrangement, there has to be parity of esteem for everyone involved. I accept that the electoral strengths of the parties involved must be reflected. No party should be left out of the loop on key issues or squeezed in some way simply because it is represented by just one Minister.

The issues I have mentioned can be resolved. Where there is a will, there is a way. The more fundamental question of the structure needs to be considered carefully. The First Minister has flown that particular kite by saying we need to look at this fundamentally. I would say to the Taoiseach that we need to be very cautious about engaging in that one. I accept that this is very difficult and challenging for all the parties involved.

However, middle Northern Ireland, if we can use that phrase to describe people working in Northern Ireland and involved in middle ground or moderate opinion, is disillusioned with the Assembly and the Executive judging from any assessment of poll analyses and so on. The people I have met are genuinely disillusioned. This is a question of how one regains the confidence of middle ground opinion so that it does not turn off politics completely. A longer term issue for the institutions under the Good Friday Agreement is the question of how they and politics might evolve within the North.

I welcome the Taoiseach's comment that the Irish Government will be fully involved in all aspects of these talks. I join with his remarks on Mr. Willie Hay, who I have met quite a number of times. He is a decent individual who engaged significantly with us and was a problem solver as opposed to anything else. A member of the DUP, he made a distinctive contribution to parliamentary relationships North and South.

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