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

I will tell the Deputies then what. What happens now is exactly what Prime Minister May said would happen. She will now engage with senior politicians in Westminster to see if they can come up with a set of proposals that would allow us to ratify the withdrawal agreement. That is where the issue lies. We have to hear from the UK what its proposals are to resolve this problem and avoid no deal. We can then consider its proposals but any proposal it makes has to be acceptable to the European Union and to Ireland. There are many ways we can protect sectors of our economy that may be exposed. We already have approval for rescue and restructure, for example.

If in the event of no deal, particular businesses fall into huge difficulty as a consequence and where jobs and viability are threatened, we can use public money to help save those businesses if saving them is a possibility. We have approved that already. It is a rescue and restructure system. We can also bring in special supports for the food industry and the agrifood industry. When Russia closed its market to agricultural imports from the Baltic states the EU was able to go in with special assistance and special aid. They are the kinds of things we can do to protect industry and jobs and to protect the agrifood sector in particular if we need to do so. The priority for the next few weeks is securing a deal so we do not get into that kind of situation.

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