Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

The one redeeming feature of the deal is that for now, temporarily, it prevents the worst of all possible outcomes, namely a no-deal Brexit and a hard North-South Border. We all genuinely agree that would be a disaster. That is a redeeming feature of the deal but it is only a temporary guarantee of that because of the consent mechanism.

As Deputy Paul Murphy rightly noted, and as socialists have argued since the inception of the Northern agreement, which is similar to the one in Lebanon that led to decades of sectarian conflict, is that it institutionalises sectarianism. The consent mechanism, therefore, is tied up with a form of institutionalised sectarianism, which means the sectarian poison continues to bubble and every issue is seen through the prism of sectarianism. That is a problem and it means the guarantee there will not be a hardening of the Border is only temporary. It will also, potentially, be an administrative and bureaucratic nightmare to administer.

On this tragic day, it might be worth shifting perspective to one of the other consequences of the sort of Brexit that it may facilitate from the point of view of Boris Johnson but which, to some extent, is already being facilitated by the policies of the European Union. One of Johnson's major drives in his version of Brexit is racist, xenophobic and anti-immigrant, to prevent the free movement of people and to target and stigmatise immigrants and refugees. We have observed today the horrific, obscene, human and tragic consequences of fortress Europe policies and of the even worse, more racist and more xenophobic policies of Boris Johnson, which he hopes and believes the deal will facilitate. It is awful to think that Ireland may have played a role in 39 people suffocating in a lorry that almost certainly travelled through this country. One has to ask what it is about European immigration policy, or fortress Europe policy, that leads people to take such desperate measures. It is because the policy is racist.

The policy feeds into matters such as what is happening in Turkey, where Europe does deals and pays money to a regime such as that of Turkey to keep the immigrants out, and then that regime does what it does to the Kurds and invades northern Syria to drive the Kurds back further. They are the self-same Kurds who fought an heroic battle against ISIS in KobanÌ and other parts of the border area, sacrificed on the large chessboard of imperial intrigue, manipulation and so-called pragmatic politics. That is what Boris Johnson sees this deal as facilitating. It is a race to the bottom in respect of racist immigration policy, attacking labour and environmental standards and so on, which the deal effectively facilitates.

It is not difficult for Europe to pose as a relatively progressive bulwark when the antagonist is Boris Johnson, who is obnoxious, right wing and racist, playing to the lowest common denominator. As Deputy Paul Murphy noted, much of what Europe is doing in respect of immigration policy can result in tragedy, as can trade deals with Bolsonaro, when we know the guy is slaughtering the rainforests, which produce oxygen for the world and allow us to breathe. Whether it is trade or German manufacturing because Germany wants to sell cars - whatever it is - it overrides the environmental and climate imperatives, and Europe does rotten deals with Bolsonaro or, more recently, with Trump.

Of course, no deal and a hard border is the worst-case scenario but let us not dress up the deal, what Johnson represents or Europe's own culpability for many of the horrors throughout Europe and the world.

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