Brendan Howlin (Wexford, Labour) | Oireachtas source

This will mark the Taoiseach's fifth EU Council meeting. It will also mark two years since the UK citizenry voted to leave the European Union. Unfortunately, little progress has been made on addressing Ireland’s core concerns to date. The bulletproof backstop that was agreed last December has clearly now not been translated into an agreed legal text. Talks on the future relationship between the UK and the EU were opened after the previous Council meeting without any such fallback being firmly and legally understood and in place.

Ireland is continually reassured of the solidarity of our fellow member states and of the EU leadership; we again heard it last week. However, as others have said, we stand at a crossroads. On 30 April addressing the civil dialogue in Dundalk, the Taoiseach said, "Over the coming weeks, I hope and expect that we will see further progress in the negotiations on developing a close overall relationship between the EU and the UK, as well as on the necessary completion of the legal text on the backstop." Sadly, two months on, that simply has not happened.

A month ago, the Taoiseach said that the Government position was that progress had to be made by the June Council meeting. The Tánaiste also said there must be significant progress in advance of the June meeting. Sadly, there has been no additional progress. Now the delayed process will become incredibly compressed. There is simply no time for further delay.

The political challenge is to come up with creative solutions that are also robust. I do not downplay or underestimate the challenges that that objective poses. It is essential that the Government insist on a deadline for the UK to produce a backstop agreement on the Border. It should be well in advance of the European Council meeting in October in order that we know exactly the position and so that Ireland is not pushed into a last-minute compromise that could fundamentally damage our interests.

The ball is firmly in the Taoiseach's court, and he must now use the commitments and solidarity repeatedly expressed by our colleagues and co-member states to ensure a deadline is agreed well in advance of October.

Last weekend the Taoiseach warned that a no-deal Brexit is now more likely. The ongoing failure of the UK Government to arrive at a settled position even among itself to address the inconsistencies of its publicly stated red lines continues to drag down this entire process. It is quite depressing to tune to some of the political commentary in Britain, as I did again this morning. A fortnight ago, I spent the day in London meeting UK Labour Party parliamentary colleagues, organisations such as Open Britain and the most senior members of the Trades Union Congress in Britain. I firmly believe the possibility is growing that the UK will crash out of the EU without a comprehensive deal. This is not because of the position adopted by the EU at Ireland's behest, but because the internal dysfunction and blatant rivalries in the Conservative Party. It makes the British Government incapable of making a deal or sticking to any stated position.

The UK Prime Minister, Mrs. May, won an important victory in the House of Commons on the exit Bill, but her Cabinet remains at war. While it continues to negotiate with itself, the consequences of a hard Brexit for jobs in Ireland, particularly in the agrifood sector, will be catastrophic.

The economic relationship between Ireland and Britain has shifted from one of historical dependence to one of mutual interdependence. Nearly £14 billion of goods are exported from Ireland to the UK, including an important percentage of the food that sustains the British people. In turn, we import almost £16 billion of UK goods into Ireland. The customs union is what makes this trade possible. No quotas, no tariffs and standardised regulations mean consignments do not need border controls or checks. Ireland also exports £16 billion of services to the UK, including from many multinationals based in Ireland. Ireland buys £10 billion of services from the UK. The Single Market facilitates this through standards for services in different sectors, the free movement of money capital and workers, and the legal certainty for business provided by the common jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice. Our trade represents over £1 billion in goods and services every week and supports tens of thousands of jobs here.

The uncertainty surrounding the final outcome of Brexit has led to financial companies and major industrial companies delaying investment or moving part of their activity out of the UK. Major companies, for example in the motor industry, are taking the supply lines out of Britain. We have heard of companies such as Airbus outline their concerns. Anybody who speaks the truth is vilified in the British press. It is hard to see how we can avoid having border infrastructure on the island of Ireland as well as border checks at British and Irish ports, if the UK remains outside the customs union and Single Market - or at least if a solution is not found for it to remain in close alignment with those institutions.

The problem, of course, is that free trade depends on sharing the same set of regulations and standards on each side of a trade agreement. All the UK Government's proposals to maintain the open border have been rejected by the EU, including Ireland. This is not out of spite or wanting to punish anybody, but because they will not work to achieve frictionless trade. We want free trade, North-South, and free trade, if it is possible to negotiate it, east-west. However, we cannot have that free trade if the UK does not maintain the same standards as the European Union. If the UK rolls back on regulation of the financial sector, it would undermine the level playing field for Irish financial services. If the UK dilutes workers’ rights or environmental rights, this again will lead to new barriers being put in place. Many of these regulations are the cornerstone of social Europe and the work of the Party of European Socialists over the decades.

Following this summit, where it is now plain little or no progress will be made on these issues, the British Prime Minister, Mrs. May, will hold a Cabinet meeting in Chequers next week.

Apparently, it will be a 24-hour marathon meeting to finalise a White Paper on its plans for a future relationship with the EU. The emerging position of Mrs. May appears to be a form of maximum facilitation rather than a customs partnership, so it will leave the customs union in a manner demanded by the Brexiteers. However, it could take a decade to develop those so-called easily available maximum facilitation arrangements, tying the UK to the customs union for all that time to maintain the backstop.

On the Single Market, the UK will seek access for manufactured goods to maintain its industrial base and protect major employers like the car manufacturing industry. Such an arrangement, if agreed with the EU, would smooth issues at the Border on our island but create enormous difficulties for our EU partners. The UK would still diverge on services and, in this scenario, take EU rules on goods and likely be subject to the ECJ. It is impossible to envisage how that set of proposals could be acceptable. It remains implausible that the UK can negotiate a deal in the timeline that is now set out. The notion that it could get a better deal with other trading blocs than is already available through the EU is fanciful, unless it determines to abandon social and environmental protections. The time to make hard decisions is fast approaching. There is also a growing campaign in the UK for a second vote on the outcome - whatever it might be - of the discussions. It makes sense to me as a logical thing to do but it is a matter for the British. The Council will also consider important reforms in other areas.

I will conclude on the Brexit issue. I have said for the past six months that it seems that the overarching position of the British Government is simply to hold together and say whatever is necessary at any given time for it to remain intact and for Prime Minister May to remain in office. We have run out of rope on that strategy in terms of the positioning of Ireland. I ask the Taoiseach to call out the British Government on that matter this weekend in order that we can get down to the nitty-gritty of hardcore discussions in the few months that are left.

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