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

I would prefer us to use this next year wisely and not do the same as we did over the past three years. We have been strong in our approach to the Brexit process. We worked for consensus and were strong not because there was a confidence and supply agreement between Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael but because there was widespread agreement here on the broad strategy and tactics applied. On the fundamental issue of whether there is a backstop agreement, there has not been a dissenting voice in this House.

The chaos in the UK political system, in both the Labour and the Conservative Parties, on this issue has given us strength in a way that is unimaginable in our historic relationship with the neighbouring isle. We should be very careful not to antagonise what must be a sense of absolute dismay within the UK at how its system is not coping with this real challenge. We should stand up for, and insist on, a certain honesty over there that the Irish backstop is not the key dividing issue. It was used by various sides, particularly the UK Treasury and Chancellor of the Exchequer, to get a soft economic Brexit, a customs arrangement of some sort to assist British business in what was always going to be a difficult situation. The political situation in Northern Ireland somewhat set up that opportunity but to then turn it around and say it is all about the backstop is a slightly dishonest approach. Without any disrespect to the people over there, who do not need to be lectured to, we should hold that line and demand that the Labour and the Conservative Parties do not distort the reality of what is happening.

Somebody used a metaphor during the week for the role of the Tánaiste and Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade, Deputy Coveney, saying he has to be careful not to be like Colonel Nicholson in "The Bridge On the River Kwai". People may remember the film about the British officers imprisoned by the Japanese and building the Burma rail line, and the bridge across the river. It was fraught and there were all sorts of difficulties and tensions. When eventually the bridge is built the British officer leading the prisoners feels great pride but when he realises that his allies are about to blow it up he has a sense that he does not want them to do that. If we feel this deal or withdrawal agreement that we have constructed, like a two year bridge construction job, is the be all and end all, our protecting it would be a bit like Colonel Nicholson in not wanting it to be blown up. If it has to go, it has to go.

We work very closely with our party in the UK and it wants a second vote, as do our colleagues in the North. We should not stand in the way of that through pride in the construction of the withdrawal agreement. We do not play a role because it is a golden rule of referenda to leave other countries to hold their debate. This issue, however, might be slightly different and break that rule because we are being dragged into it in a way that is not quite honest or true. That gives us a certain license to clarify the truth should it come to a second vote and I hope it will because I hope Britain does not leave. It fundamentally weakens our union, our relationship with the neighbouring island and if there is a possibility of that being reconsidered by the British people I hope that arrives.

I have friends on the Brexit side and I have quizzed them to try to understand why. They would not be Deputy Boyd Barrett's friends on the socialist side, they are from the business side although there was socialist support for Brexit two or three years ago. The business argument is strange because it saying that Europe and the West in general are in decline and it asks why it would hitch itself to a declining global institution when development is occurring in India and China and elsewhere. Fintan O'Toole wrote a brilliant article last week on the historical mythology behind some of this thinking. I think it almost goes back to the Elizabethan era when Francis Drake and others were out on the high seas. They had to have this ability to do trade deals and to act in that way on the global stage. That is where their thinking comes from. It is deeply flawed because global trade and the globalised model will not work on a privateer basis. We need to reconstruct globalisation towards sustainability in every way and towards sustainability in social and environmental policy.

It was interesting that in his contribution today the Taoiseach referred to another issue for discussion at the Council, the implementation of the Services Directive, the radical scaling up of that project to deliver greater competitiveness and economic growth. He referred to the Copenhagen Economics report, Making EU Trade in Services Work for All. I briefly availed of the chance to try to read some of that document before speaking. To my mind, it did not address this issue. I do not get a strong sense from it or in anything I have heard from the Taoiseach that the economic model has to change, that it has to be for all. The rise in right wing, nationalist and populist sentiment in Europe is because we do not have that collective care for how an ultra-competitive, ultra-productive and ultra-growth-orientated globalised economy can look after all. It does not look after all. That has to change.

Further on in his speech the Taoiseach referred to disinformation and the role of political operators or Facebook and others as being on the agenda for discussion. Deputy Naughton and I happened to be in the House of Commons the week before last attending a committee hearing on disinformation and the regulation of Facebook. I asked Facebook whether it would apply the General Data Protection Regulation, GDPR, in all its global operations and it said it would, that it is the new standard. That connects with the Brexit issue. No matter what Britain does, in this critical area of digital services and in every aspect of the digital revolution, Facebook will apply GDPR standards, and effectively the European Court of Justice will remain the arbiter of disputes in that area, as will EU legislation because that is increasingly the one global standard. We have to be careful. Where do we stand on the regulation of Facebook and the new digital services economy? We have to stand for workers' rights and better pay. We do not stand for the American growth-at-all-costs and greed-is-good model. That old economic model is dead and gone. We need a new and different one.

To come full circle, we should apply that thinking in the year ahead of us, start thinking and doing things differently and try to achieve the same consensus on some issues that we achieved consensus on the Brexit negotiations so that we have strength in the development of our economy in every way.

I will give some examples of where we should apply that. We can refer to it in our discussions on the European Council. First, in our budget approach we should heed what Seamus Coffey said last week, which we all know has validity to it and is worth attention. Before having another budget we should make sure that it is not just the usual election budget where we buy votes either with tax cuts or with spending as that is not the key priority for us. Could we achieve consensus on that in the future?

Could we also take what we are doing in the Joint Committee on Climate Action, which we know is central to where the economy has to go? We know that by the end of next year under European Union governance rules we must have a national energy and climate action plan that is fit for the following ten and 20 years. Could we work in consensus on a revised national development plan that delivers some of the objectives of decarbonisation that we seek.

One could broaden it out as there is a range of different areas where people might seek consensus. When Pope Francis was here the Taoiseach mentioned a new covenant between church and State. Could we in a safe space, in a synodal way, without the understandable confrontation we have seen in the past six months in terms of the abortion issue, bring people from churches and none together to work collaboratively in a broader way, much as we did recently with the Citizens' Assembly and other debates, to consider issues such as the role of religion in the education system or in the health system? I say that having attended my own local parish meeting the other night which asked the exact same question. It is happening from the ground up so why would we not try to do it from the top down at the same time? That would make this country a very interesting place because some of the values in such a forum might inform a more social, caring and environmentally sustainable economy.

We have not answered those hard questions in the past three years. We have not said how we will fund third level education. Neither have we said how we will fund the media. There are so many different areas where we are failing and where what we are doing is not working. To return to my central point, we should go to Brussels this week somewhat proud, first of the solidarity our European colleagues have shown to us. I was at a meeting yesterday and I mind an image which came to me. It would be akin to Wolfe Tone sailing to Bantry Bay and instead of facing a storm him reaching it on a sunny day. Europe came to our aid in this time in a way that was real. It came home to us that solidarity with our European colleagues can deliver real strength. We should thank them for that. We should not antagonise, look down on, demean or get into a slagging war with the UK no matter what the 50 Tory MPs on the nationalist side say, which is very antagonistic towards us. We should not rise to that. We should retain our close relationships and good friendships with the likes of John Major and so many others in that party and in the Labour Party, despite the lack of leadership we are seeing in that quarter and the blame it puts on the Irish backstop, which beggars belief as a political analysis of the political issues they face.

We are established 100 years and we need to think about what we will do in the next year in an innovative way. Deputy Boyd Barrett and I were part of the debate yesterday. I thought it was a useful discussion. We should bring that thinking into this Chamber and for however long next year as we would do the State some service.

See this speech in context