Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this matter. I note from the invitation letter of President Donald Tusk that members will be updated on where the EU stands in terms of a political discussion on the external aspects of migration, with a specific focus on the financial measures necessary to stem the flow of illegal migrants from Africa.

That is vital but we are late to the table and it is only now that we are really trying to deal with stemming the flow. We have been silent. There has been deafening silence on the genocide that has been taking place in the Middle East. I have said this before and I will say it again: those countries, including Syria, Iraq and many others, were safer and better places for different ethnic and religious beliefs. They were better for people to practise their religion and they could do it with impunity. Since we went in there with all guns blazing - I am referring to the Americans, the British and everyone else - it has become a hell on earth. The persecution and genocide towards different sects, including Christian and minority Muslim sects and Yazidis as well as others, has been horrific, but we are ignoring it. Donald Tusk might say that we need a specific focus on the financial requirements necessary to stem the flow of illegal migrants from Africa. However, we can never cure a problem or a symptom by going to the doctor without finding the cause. We could go to the doctor on a weekly basis or to any other medical practitioner either, but to no effect. The cause is obvious: we are reluctant to talk about that or engage or deal with that to any major extent. I believe that we are codding ourselves unless we deal with that and face up to the challenges. We must face down the big powers of Saudi Arabia and others, or else we are going nowhere.

President Macron's presentation about trade negotiations is on the agenda as well. The UK Prime Minister, Mrs. May, will share her reflections about the current status of the Brexit talks. I imagine that will be interesting.

I have recently come back from two days in Liverpool at the British-Irish Parliamentary Assembly. I do not see any softening of attitudes. Actually, I was rather shocked at how happy the British are with their decision and how adamant they are that it is going ahead. They do not want to delay it with talks of two years or three years. There is talk of an easy soft landing and seamless borders. They are not bothered. They are talking up their trade and trade deals with many new countries. We are in a perilous situation here because of our direct exports and trade with the United Kingdom. They do not seem to be too bothered about here. I suppose they never were bothered back in the old colonial times, but we have built up a good relationship. It is vital.

It was frightening to hear the address yesterday morning from the President of the British Irish Chamber of Commerce. The body wants us to be positive and to talk it up. However, when something is staring us starkly in the face, it is difficult to be positive. It is difficult to be positive about something as calamitous as what may happen or what will happen. This will affect people right across the sectors from agriculture to health to people's rights and so on. We are going to have to start bouncing above our buck, as we often said we did in Europe. Now we are becoming innocent bystanders. A phoney war is going on between the big powers, including President Macron, Donald Tusk and such people in Europe, who cared little about us when we met our own crisis. When we needed friends, we found out that with friends like them, we did not need any enemies.

The Council will also include discussions on the relocation of the UK-based agencies. We plan to be quiet and cúramach, trying to slip in tenders as we get them to Dublin. I am unsure where we are going to house them or those who take the jobs that come with them, unless we build camps out in Howth, in the sea or unless we bring in some tug boats to house them. We do not even have the capacity to house the people we have at the moment. I am all for the relocation of industry that we can get here, but where are we going to house them? We are codding ourselves. We cannot house them. It is clearly obvious.

The last speaker is right. Deputy Haughey might interrupt me as well. A point of order is a point of order and I accept the right to make one, but the Chair is in charge, thank God. It is an abject failure of our housing policies. Deputy Wallace mentioned that we are going in the wrong direction. We are going in no direction. It is like the calm after the hurricane. We are stopped, stationary. We are talking about it. We have reports. We have Rebuilding Ireland and imaginative supply. We are going here, there and yonder. We are filling up the archives with reports but we are not building any houses. What we are building is not worth talking about. Rebuilding Ireland is an example. We could not build a little town in Connemara with the number of houses the Government has planned to build, to be fair. That is Rebuilding Ireland. I warned the then Minister for Housing, Planning, Community and Local Government, Deputy Coveney, about it. I am on the housing committee. It is frustrating to be talking and talking. If talk could build houses, my God, we could export them. However, nothing is happening; there are only reports. It is stating the obvious. We should listen to the Jesuits or any other group that produces independent reports from the coalface. They are telling us the same thing: nothing is happening in that area.

We talked about the EU fiscal rules. Other countries have broken them with impunity. We are suffering because of the way we had to obey them. Now is our chance to borrow that money at 1% to try to do something about building houses. We need to invest because without money it is not possible to build, buy anything or go to the sweet shop to give a child a present for communion. If we do not have the money - airgead in the póca - then we can forget it. We do not have the money to do it. We can give all the reports back to the councils and blame the county councils. They say they do not have the money that the Government says it gave them. There is talk of so many millions and then the figure is reported and changed.

However, I suppose the Brexit issue will most immediately impact us in the short to medium term. What is becoming ever clearer is the limited value of the European Council meetings. We can see that. The Minister of State has to go and do her best. I wish her well - turas maith.

We seem to be lurching from one chaotic negotiation to another without any outcomes. Things are getting worse on the migration and Brexit issues and on the many other issues of member states. Let us consider what is happening in Spain and elsewhere.

What are we going there for? It is only a glorified talking shop that comes at enormous expense. The EU and the United Kingdom are facing each other across the table. Each is waiting for the other to blink, with political egos on full display - that is without doubt. Any independent or media observer will say as much. It is a case of who will blink first. Are we all going to fall off a cliff into the Irish Sea before someone blinks and then wake up and smell the coffee?

What does it do to break the current impasse? The answer is nothing and I am sorry to say we are not doing anything either. The gravity of the situation is increasing on a weekly basis. The uncertainty and confusion have not been diminished, only exaggerated. The Minister of State should listen and talk to her colleagues who were at the British-Irish Parliamentary Assembly, including some who are in the House such as Deputy Aengus Ó Snodaigh. She should listen to the deep distrust - I will not say arrogance because that would be the wrong word - of the European Union and the belief the United Kingdom made the right decision to leave, that its economy is the one to worry about, not ours or anybody else's. One cannot blame them for that. They are MPs and Lords from all parts of the United Kingdom, including Wales and Scotland, and spoke in unison, with the exception of a few.

The Guardianhas reported that the British Government will be forced to delay bringing the EU withdrawal Bill back to the House of Commons for a second time as it struggles to respond to hundreds of hostile amendments. We are used to filibustering here also, but it is only bandaging, delaying and letting the patient get more sick, after which there will be a bigger problem to deal with. We also read that this could mean the withdrawal of the Bill, which would not be brought back to the House of Commons until after the week-long recess early next month. The clock is ticking and time is not in our favour or on our side. With the budget in the United Kingdom due to be announced on 22 November, the British Government may struggle to fit in the necessary eight days of debate before Christmas. The Shadow Brexit Secretary, Keir Starmer, said the fresh delay called into question the Prime Minister's ability to press ahead with Brexit. I hope it does, but the uncertainty is frightening and very dangerous. He is quoted as saying, "This is further proof that the Government's Brexit strategy is in paralysis. The negotiations are in deadlock and now a crucial piece of legislation is facing further delay” and subject to filibustering. This is profoundly alarming.

I know that the Taoiseach has already commented on this, but in an interview on the BBC's "Spotlight" programme he is reported to have said the ambiguity surrounding the current situation meant the other 27 nations in the European Union were struggling to grasp what the United Kingdom wanted from the negotiations. We are all struggling with it. The Taoiseach has his €5 million investment in a new, all-powerful spin team, but he is going to need many millions and spinners to get us out of this one. Spin is no good; what we need is substance. I appeal to the Minister of State to implore the Taoiseach to stand up for the country to find our rightful place and try to get clarity and support from the other 26 countries. They need to support us because we have always been such good Europeans. When asked to jump, we asked how high. Now it is time for other EU member states to jump over to us and give us some moral support.

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