Billy Kelleher (Cork North Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The Good Friday Agreement is an international agreement between two sovereign states which is to foster closer integration on the island of Ireland, to ensure there is no hard border, to ensure the concept of consent, of constitutional democracy and politics and the rights of citizens in the North to be Irish citizens, British citizens and to have dual citizenship, and to be citizens of the European Union. These particular issues are critically important. I said previously that if we have a hard Brexit that does not take into account the Good Friday Agreement we are allowing another Parliament to drive a coach and four through the Good Friday Agreement, when that same Parliament and Government has an obligation, like this Parliament and Government, to uphold the principles of the Good Friday Agreement. For all those reasons - I would like to have contributed more on the business and enterprise area of my brief - I believe Brexit and what flows from that must be put into a strong emotional and intellectual debate where we say to the Members of Westminster, that when they are making decisions they do and must and have an obligation to look beyond their own narrow ideological view of what Europe is and is not, because they have an obligation to the Good Friday Agreement itself.

I urge that when MPs are making decisions in the next number of weeks, that they look at their international responsibilities, what good neighbourliness is and means, and I hope they can come to an arrangement that facilitates the North-South institutions and the basic principles of the Good Friday Agreement.

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