Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

-----to re-establish the Executive and the Assembly in Northern Ireland. Obviously there is the DUP-Sinn Féin dynamic. There is a real trust issue there. There is mistrust between those two parties which is making it extremely difficult to come to an agreement. I am not sure what the two Governments can do to engender trust between the DUP and Sinn Féin but we will certainly do anything we can. The lack of trust is one of the fundamental problems and one of the fundamental reasons why those two parties have not been able to come to agreement, or at least not to an agreement that could stick.

There is obviously also the atmosphere of Brexit, which creates enormous difficulties. It is going to be difficult to get the Assembly and Executive back up and running until we have a clearer idea of the shape of Brexit, of the new relationship between the UK and the European Union, and of how Northern Ireland and the Executive and Assembly fit into it. It is going to be difficult to get the institutions up and running in the next couple of months for that reason. The ongoing renewable heat incentive, RHI, investigation is also part of the backdrop to this. I am, however, confident that it will be possible to have the Executive and the Assembly functioning again. It is very much in the interests of Northern Ireland. All the time when I meet people from Northern Ireland they are so frustrated and so disappointed with the political parties. It is now even a case of a plague on all your houses when talking to many people because they are so disappointed that the institutions are not up and running. As co-guarantor of the agreement, the Government will continue to strive until things are working again.

See this speech in context