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

Did Sinn Féin inform the Government that it was going to collapse the Northern Ireland Assembly and insist on an election? As a co-guarantor of the agreement, the Government would, surely, have been entitled to advance consultation, particularly from a Nationalist party. Was the demand that the First Minister step down during an inquiry raised with the Taoiseach before it was announced? Does the Taoiseach think a good-faith effort to resolve the problem should have included asking the Irish Government to mediate?

In the aftermath of the election, people will hope things will be restored but it is interesting that the Taoiseach is often attacked for not engaging. He is repeatedly told the Irish Government is a co-guarantor of the agreement and there should be consultation all round. Yet, it seems to me that these institutions were collapsed in a very hurried and destructive way. It is damaging, given that Brexit is the gravest threat to the island of Ireland. I do not see how the collapsing of the institutions of Northern Ireland can advance a proper response to Brexit, despite all the talk and articulation about it. I would have expected that the Taoiseach would have been personally consulted in advance of the bringing down of the institutions.

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