Anne Rabbitte (Galway East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank Deputy Michael Moynihan for sharing his time.

I also welcome the opportunity to speak tonight and acknowledge this is a technical Bill. I also acknowledge the hard work that the backroom team has done to prepare it to bring it to the floor this evening.

I will speak to the Bill in a different vein and light because I will speak from the point of view of children. I am spokesperson for children and youth affairs and acknowledge that the Ombudsman for Children and the Northern Ireland Commissioner for Children and Young People have held round table discussions for the past two years. Such events occurred once in Croke Park and once in Newry. At those discussions, we listened to the voices of young teenagers and young adults as to how Brexit was going to impact them. They were clear in what they thought would be the ramifications of a no-deal Brexit or a Brexit under any deal scenario. They said that Brexit will impact profoundly on the island of Ireland and the current generation of young people will be those who have to live with the decisions made during these negotiations. They also said a hard border, or any regression to the violence of the past, should and must be avoided at all costs. The Good Friday Agreement is to be protected. Brexit must not be utilised to drive deeper societal divisions and it must not limit opportunities for those on the island of Ireland. Work, travel and study opportunities for all must be maintained. North-South co-operation on healthcare, education, policing, safety and child protection must remain, along with cross-Border travel. Access to services must be guaranteed. That is what we, as a Parliament, are trying to deliver with all of the pieces of legislation that have come, and will come, before the House.

Those young people did not have a vote on Brexit, in Ireland or Northern Ireland, and are solely depending on us to bring forward legislation to protect them and their livelihoods into the future. They talked about how many of them travel north and south for education and the ramifications for their grant system and how it will impact on them. They talked about how they will cross up and down on the train. One of the children spoke about their parents being separated with one living in the Republic of Ireland and the other in Northern Ireland. That child travels across the Border on a daily basis.

Another concern was if a child chose to go to education in Queens or Coleraine, how would that impact and how would the grant system operate? The Government has addressed it in section 5 of the legislation. That is welcome because there needs to be a clear understanding that we will protect the young people.

The Minister for Children and Youth Affairs, Deputy Zappone, came before the Committee for Children and Youth Affairs. She said that, while she did not have a real, direct impact on how the legislation was drafted, she fed into many other parts of it. Justice is a significant part that the Department of Children and Youth Affairs fed into on things like care orders or children going into various forms of care in the UK. Ten children a year have to go to the UK. Children are protected under the Brussels II regulations. Our children were not a part of the makings of Brexit but are dependent on us and how we roll it out.

Deputy Naughten spoke about how rural Ireland will survive. I am from east Galway, the county with the largest suckler herd in the country. Agriculture is a huge issue and there is fear within my constituency and right across the west of Ireland. The fear factor is the fear of the unknown. I understand why we could not have this debate earlier because at all times we had to give as much latitude and space to the UK to come to a reasonable conclusion so we do not find ourselves in a no-deal scenario. The fact remains that Brexit is not a good deal for us.

Tourism and agriculture in the west and along the Border and midland regions are concerns. We need to capitalise and plan for the future of tourism because that is a market. The new trade into east Galway is people on their feet. The question is how we can get people in and market, brand and sell the area. The Ireland's Hidden Heartlands campaign will have a significant part to play in that.

There is a new organisation developing at the moment called Grow Remote. It provides an opportunity for people to choose to work from home. These people can work from home if they have proper access to the Internet and it offers a lifestyle balance. It also gives those people the opportunity to earn a good living working on the tech spectrum. Many of them are graphic designers and some are web designers and programmers. They can work for multinational companies, based anywhere in the world, from their homes. These people do not impact climate change while still having the opportunity to work. This is a way to keep alive parts of rural Ireland that might be impacted by Brexit.

I said at committee last week that we should look at areas in which Garda stations have closed or the OPW has buildings. Regarding investment, on the plus side of Brexit, we could see industry coming to us because we are an English speaking country and we should look at the opportunities on that side of it.

The Government could look at making available Office of Public Works buildings with sufficient broadband connectivity for those who wish to work from rural communities. We need to give a lifeline to the rest of Ireland and to show that we are open for business.

The message which needs to go out is that we are all working together. It was unfair earlier on, however, for certain Deputies to make sweeping statements when their own party had passed opportunities to take up positions in various parliaments which could have averted much of this Brexit scenario. They had an opportunity but they chose to walk away from it. This situation could have been avoided many months ago if certain people had worked together in Stormont and had taken up their positions in Westminster. At the beginning of the Brexit situation, only a small number of votes were needed to avoid this whole scenario. Members of this House had an impact on that.

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