Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Deputy Martin raised a number of points. When I met the First Minister and Deputy First Minister, I encouraged them to bring in the SDLP so that they could brief that party on the developments that were taking place at the talks, both under the auspices of the First Minister, the Deputy First Minister, and the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade and the Secretary of State. The UUP, with its leader, Mr. Nesbitt, has stated it is going into opposition but that does not mean it should not be informed of what is happening. The SDLP, which was in a slightly different position, was welcoming in principle of many of the issues and was opposed to others. While I did not advise them, I certainly encouraged the First Minister and Deputy First Minister to do that and not have drift between the parties. I take Deputy Martin's point.

I felt that if one is now going to have a different system that applies across the United Kingdom, then the question is whether one accepts responsibility to deal with welfare in the first place. The decision was taken by the politicians - it was not our strand to deal with - that this should be based in London and the extra £500 million was given as a consequence to deal with an economy emerging from conflict. In respect of the past, it was always going to come down to that at the end of the day.

Will the Stormont House Agreement and Fresh Start be able to deal with the legacies of the past and will the historic unit - the independent person - be able to have access to material that is currently off limits? It remains to be seen, whether in the case of Ballymurphy, Finucane, Kingsmill or whatever.

In response to Deputy Boyd Barrett, we have come through some fairly difficult choices down here. This year will be the best year ever in terms of collection of corporation tax. We will exceed, as I stated, the €6.5 billion plus gathered in 2006. That is because there are more firms now paying tax. Between those which pay €100,000 and €1 million, it is up very significantly.

I do not agree with Deputy Boyd Barrett that this is a stale, regressive, old austerity agreement. I believe it is the politicians, elected by the people, measuring up to implement this agreement, which contains a lot of beneficial elements on a North-South basis and particularly for the people of Northern Ireland.

Clearly, on the question of the return to greater austerity, there will have to be structural changes made in Northern Ireland. We had to make them here and look what has happened in four and a half years-----

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