Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputy for giving me the opportunity to respond to what is the issue of the day, despite storms, rugby matches and so on. These are very serious issues. The British Prime Minister has put forward what we regard as a serious proposal. We are taking it seriously and so is the EU. That is why the response will be a cautious one until we have had an opportunity to study the detail of the three documents. These are the letter to President Juncker, the detailed explanatory memorandum in terms of what is being proposed, and the legal text which has been given to Mr. Barnier's task force for consideration. We have had discussions with the Barnier task force already on the detail of that and there is probably discussion happening right now with our ambassador in Brussels. We had a conference call this morning in my Department in which we went through in some detail our initial assessment, which is as follows.

There are some positives in this proposal. The British Government is now proposing, effectively, full regulatory alignment for goods and agrifood products on the island of Ireland. That is consistent with the backstop. There is a whole series of technical issues that I believe will be a problem with this, and which would need to be the subject of discussion and negotiation. There are two significant problems with this proposal that are very clear from the outset, one of which is in relation to customs. If one is insisting on Northern Ireland being in a separate customs territory from the rest of the island of Ireland, then despite this paper saying that the British Government wants to try to avoid customs checks, it raises the prospect of customs checks somewhere, not just in premises and businesses. We believe this will be a real problem.

Deputy Calleary asked if this proposal deals with the commitment for no border infrastructure on the island of Ireland. No, it does not with regard to customs. Does it allow for an all-island economy to function, as we had been given a commitment on in December 2017 and in the withdrawal agreement, with the backstop? No, it does not. The customs proposal is, therefore, a problem.

The second significant issue is whether and how an Executive in Northern Ireland or Northern Ireland could be given a consultative role in how these proposals would take effect. We cannot support any proposal that suggests that one party, or a minority in Northern Ireland, could make the decisions for the majority in terms of how these proposals would be implemented in the future. That would not be consistent with the Good Friday Agreement and is not something that we could possibly support as part of any final deal.

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