Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

This week was a good week for the British Prime Minister, Theresa May. It was about time she stood up to her former Foreign Secretary, made the call and showed some leadership. It stands well to her that she did so. The fact sky has not fallen and a vote of confidence has not been called shows it was bluff, and it was good to call it.

My assessment is that we are still in high very risk territory of a no deal outcome to the whole process. I say that not to be in any way critical of the Irish Government because I think that by and large it has approached the negotiations in the right way. I think our public service and the general approach has been right but we are unfortunate to be in a particularly difficult situation. Earlier in the week I read an article in either The Spectator or the New Statesmanwhich quoted Lyndon B. Johnson who said the first rule in politics is that you have got to be good at maths and counting numbers. That is where I see a problem, because no matter what way I look at this, the numbers do not stack up for whatever deal is agreed between the European Union and the UK Government in terms of it getting through the UK Parliament. It will get through the European Parliament handy enough because Europe, by and large, has moved on. We will have a particular decision to make. If we are not happy with it, we may be in a very tricky position. The real problem exists in the UK Parliament. It is about realpolitik. One cannot imagine that there are not up to 70 hardline Brexiteers waiting in the long grass for their opportunity to say that a soft deal Brexit is not what they want. From their perspective, it is probably the greatest giveaway of sovereignty that we have seen in my lifetime in terms of it not having an influence on European rules and regulations and at the same time committing to it. It is hard to believe that anything could change in their minds. For Theresa May to get it through her Parliament, she would then be reliant on the Labour Party or the Scottish National Party, SNP, to get it over the line. I do not see that the Labour Party would make the political call of keeping the Tory Party in government and allowing the Brexit deal to go through while it remains in opposition for the next while. Why would the Labour Party do that? Some of its members might agree to it, but not the numbers that would be needed to get it over the line. Similarly, why would the Scottish National Party support a Tory Government that has not been gracious to it? Given Scotland voted against Brexit how could the SNP have the mandate to provide the support that would be needed to get it over the line? In those circumstances, my prognosis is that even though it has been a good week in the negotiations in that at last there is a position, it is softer and all of the red line issues which Theresa May set out over the last year have evaporated we are heading towards a crash-out Brexit and no deal is a real prospect. This would do real damage to relations on this island and east-west.

My final assessment is a personal one - we are all following this trying to work our what way it will go while we cannot control it. I have a sense from listening to Mr. Barnier, and to President Juncker when he was here, that while the European Union will agree pretty much to most anything on our island in terms of keeping the frictionless free border, I am not so sure it is going to give this have-cake-and-eat-it option to the UK Government in terms of bits and parts of the Single Market rules applying or not.

My instinct is that it will put the foot down over a border in the Irish Sea. If there is to be a deal, that is a real risk for the European Union. It is not a risk; to my mind it is a very likely prospect and one the European Union is entitled to pursue as a negotiating position, although we might want it to be more flexible because we want to keep good relations with the UK. Again on that side I see risk. No matter what way I look I see risk in the whole deal not going through and real risk to what happens in Northern Ireland. We need to prepare for that. We need to batten down the hatches and prepare for the worst eventuality. Please God, it will not arise, but based on my political analysis and doing the numbers based on my simple junior certificate maths, it is not easy to see how it will get through.

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