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

I thank the Deputies for their questions. As I stated in Wexford a few weeks ago, I felt the US Vice President's comments on Brexit, made while in Ireland, were unbalanced. He specifically called on the EU and Ireland to negotiate in good faith with the British Prime Minister, Mr. Johnson. That should have been qualified by recognising that we had negotiated in good faith with the former British Prime Minister, Mrs. May, for two years and came to an agreement. It should have been qualified by a call on the UK Government to also negotiate in good faith with Ireland and the EU. I had the opportunity to speak to him briefly in New York last week and I said that to him. I said that I was disappointed with what he said in Farmleigh and I felt it was unbalanced. He acknowledged what I had to say and assured me that he had taken back to the White House the concerns that I had expressed to him in our meeting in Farmleigh about stability, in particular, in Northern Ireland.

In terms of any spending at the Trump resort in Doolin in County Clare, that would have been incurred by the Garda and to the best of my knowledge would relate to accommodation and subsistence. I do not have any details of that but I am sure that the Garda Síochána would be able to provide that for Deputies on request.

It seems the total security cost for the two high-profile visits this year by President Trump and Vice President Pence would be somewhere in the region of €15 million to €18 million. What was not mentioned by Deputies was that the Garda overtime budget allocated for this year is, in fact, the second highest Garda overtime budget allocated ever.

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