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

I welcome that. These negotiations are an opportunity to address this by ensuring that those involved represent distinct interests, including those of countries with a major stake in the final deal with the United Kingdom.

The Taoiseach should also use the period between now and the special summit in September to launch a specific diplomatic initiative to ensure that each member state is briefed at a high level on Ireland’s position.

At the meeting last week of our European party, the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe, I outlined for the five Prime Ministers present and the other Governments represented the importance of this issue for Ireland. I am convinced that there would be a substantial, positive outcome from a comprehensive initiative to tour and brief all our partners and not just the largest two.

The handling of the possibility of establishing an all-island forum on Brexit, unfortunately, has been close to shambolic. It is genuinely extraordinary that Ministers would do interviews about a proposal before making contact with Northern parties. It is the inevitable outcome of five years of stepping back from deep, ongoing involvement in all-island issues. The rejection of the idea by First Minister Foster is regrettable, and her statement that there are more than enough all-island bodies is unacceptable given her duty to examine areas for such bodies as part of the required review under the Belfast Agreement. What was missing from her comments was an acceptance of the deep threat to our economies. She is fully entitled to believe in the Brexit cause. Her dismissal of the potential threat of Brexit is a completely different thing and ignores the will of the people of Northern Ireland and the mounting economic evidence.

It is the right and obligation of our Government to speak up for the social and economic interests of the whole island in Brexit negotiations. We cannot impose our will on the people of Northern Ireland, but we can and must make sure that their importance to us, and vice versa, is not ignored.

As I said in our debate last week, this is too urgent for us to leave it to business as usual. The Government must now publish details of how it intends to use existing structures to ensure deep engagement with institutions in the North and to ensure that economic and social interests on both sides of the Border are heard.

The joint DUP-Sinn Féin exclusion of formal civil society dialogue from the Northern institutions in contravention of the Belfast Agreement must be challenged immediately. The pattern for quite some years has been a refusal to establish that civil society dialogue. It was part of the negotiated deal on the Good Friday Agreement but, regrettably, the main parties in the North did not want to know about it. We should now offer all necessary assistance to employer bodies, trades unions, farmers’ organisations and others to convene dedicated North-South expert groups on their concerns and to present their views as soon as possible.

We had a Brexit seminar over 12 months ago in Cavan hosted by Deputy Brendan Smith. We had the IFA economist present who gave a great presentation on the perils of Brexit for Ulster farmers. It was a pity her views and research was not disseminated more widely in the North in a rational and cool way in the context of the debate, but we got a sense at that seminar of the level of expertise available that can be of assistance now in an all-island approach to our negotiations.

On the issue of a potential unification referendum, the demand for one was made by Sinn Féin without any attempt to reach out to other parties or groups. It was made without the provision of any evidence that it might pass. It was clearly intended to be nothing other than a bit of grandstanding from our most consistently anti-EU party.

I hope that Brexit will mean that a substantial number of people in Northern Ireland change their position and become supporters of unification. If this happens then we should have a reunification referendum. The partisan posturing of a party which only last year issued leaflets calling on Belfast voters to vote on sectarian lines simply puts off the day when a reunification referendum could be held and won.

Until we see the result of the Tory election the nature of negotiations with London will be uncertain. Mr. Gove, as a journalist, was one of the most consistently wrong and ill-informed commentators on Northern Ireland. The other candidates have no significant record to assess. What we do know is that all appear to support the basic economic strategy outlined by Chancellor Osborne yesterday. As predicted, this is moving in the opposite way to the social vision claimed by our anti-European Union Deputies as the basis for the "Leave" vote.

Until 2011, it was a tradition that the Taoiseach would have a meeting with the British Prime Minister within a week or two of either taking office. We should seek to have that tradition restored.

Last week, I set out my party’s policy concerning Scotland and the fact that it must not be treated like a normal candidate country should it vote for independence and seek to retain European Union membership. I welcome the Taoiseach’s presentation of the views of First Minister Sturgeon at the summit.

The objective of reducing corporation tax below 15% is a serious issue for Ireland. A detailed study included in the latest ESRI quarterly review directly addressed the issue of the possible impact on Ireland of reductions in the British rate. By the figures they produced, a reduction of over 5% in the British rate would potentially reduce investment in Ireland by non-EU firms by over one quarter. What this figure might be following Brexit is unknown, but it will not turn from a major negative to a positive. That reinforces the need for us to resist domestic and European voices calling for greater taxation of employers. In this context, a message in forthcoming meetings should be that Brexit cannot be used as an excuse for resurrecting old demands to end national discretion in tax policy.

The ESRI study also demonstrated that the decision taken in 1997 to invest in research and build the knowledge base of the economy is central to Ireland’s long-term prospects. It is one area where we have the ability to create high value, high security employment. The delayed and then rushed science strategy published before the general election contained many things but a financial commitment to a broad research community was not one of them. We should note that the British science community, one of the strongest in the world, is in near panic over the impact of Brexit and we have to revisit this area. We have to use research and innovation to increase our opportunities and limit the threats from Brexit. That particularly applies to Northern Ireland where many companies currently applying for grants under Horizon 2020, for example, are in a very difficult if not hopeless situation in terms of the prospects of getting grants under that programme given the decision to leave the European Union.

In other business, the summit agreed to give more flexibility to Spain and Portugal in regard to meeting fiscal targets. That is welcome. The semester process cannot be allowed to degenerate into a crude and inflexible control mechanism which ignores economic reality.

Some have begun to lobby for the lifting of sanctions concerning the invasion and partition of Ukraine. In all cases this is justified by business interests.

I hope the Taoiseach remains strong in opposing this. There is no surer way towards more aggression against European states than to reward aggression by removing the limited penalties that have been applied.

We need to request a shared initiative against the rising tide of intolerance and scapegoating that we are seeing in many countries. Ireland should take the lead in pushing for greater solidarity and resolution in the face of an immediate threat to fundamental values. Last week's summit set no definitive course. September's summit should bring some greater clarity. In the meantime, Ireland has no time to waste.

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