Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

A notice was recently posted to the effect that Ireland has been placed on a watch-list in the context of its trade with the US. The report points out that Ireland had a good proportion of the overall trade surplus of $47 billion with the US last year and a current account balance of payments surplus of 9.2%. In the world of Trump economics, these are seen as evidence of unfair practices on our part. On the face of it, placing us on a watch-list for countries manipulating their currencies is really odd. Did the Taoiseach raise this matter with the President? In the world of Trumpism and in light of the forthcoming election, this has the potential to give rise to a conflict between Ireland and the United States, one which the latter will have initiated. Just as we are all fearful of war with Iran, we would be quite fearful of an aggressive stance on the part of the US which is totally out of character with that adopted by all other recent Presidents in respect of Ireland.

Trump famously said at his meeting with the Taoiseach, if he was quoted correctly, "'It'll all work out with your wall, your border." Where is our wall? I think we all know where the Border is and what we want. Did the Taoiseach just regard that as a passing comment or did he take it on and state that while we have stone walls, which President Trump may have seen in County Clare, we certainly do not have a walled border, nor do any of us intend that something like that would ever be built. Did the Taoiseach have enough time to perhaps contend the matter of this space or this wall with him?

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