Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Those figures are quite scary. These companies trade with Britain and employ people through their trade with Britain. Their ability to retain their employees relies on the success or failure of this aspect of their business in many cases. The Minister told me three weeks ago that 40% of exporters did not have the necessary authorisation that will be the minimum requirement for businesses that wish to trade with or through the UK after Brexit. Given the Minister stated some 44,000 businesses do not yet have the authorisation they are required to get if they are to continue to trade with Britain after the end of next month, it is clear that a serious question needs to be answered. Are we failing to prepare ourselves for the emerging chaos related to Brexit? Are thousands of businesses and exporters sleepwalking into this chaos? The Minister mentioned that 25,000 of these 44,000 businesses have been directly contacted and that the other 19,000 will be contacted by Monday. Is that correct? Will the Minister reaffirm that? Does the contact in question take the form of a letter, or are follow-up conversations with these businesses taking place? We need to ramp this up dramatically.

See this speech in context