Michael Creed (Cork North West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to say a few brief words on the Brexit debacle and the legislation before the House. I listened from my office in Leinster House and from the back of the Convention Centre to much of the debate. It appears to me there is a self-delusion at play to the effect that if only we were properly prepared, we could have a benign Brexit. People have rightly referenced particular areas in this regard but a benign Brexit is a contradiction in terms. Brexit is an ugly beast that has been foisted upon us. We have done our utmost to prepare for it and I salute the Minister and his colleagues in this regard. Yet, even in the context of a negotiated trade agreement without tariffs and quotas, the Brexit reality will come crashing confrontationally in front of citizens in supermarket aisles, cattle marts, milking parlours and dairy processing plants. The same applies for students who travel to the UK and to those working in fishing harbours from Killybegs to Castletownbere. It applies to those working in our import and export points, including Rosslare, Cork Airport, Cork Harbour, Dublin Airport and Dublin Port. The reality of Brexit will come crashing down in front of us on 1 January 2021. Notwithstanding how much effort we have made to prepare for that reality, the truth is that it will have severe adverse impacts. There will be economic casualties and job losses. There will be opportunities that were within our grasp prior to Brexit which will not revisit us in a post-Brexit scenario. That is the unfortunate reality of something that had been built up over almost 50 years of shared membership of the European Union and is now, by the democratic will of the United Kingdom, being unilaterally withdrawn by the United Kingdom effectively overnight. That reality will dawn on us on 1 January 2021.

As I said, the change will come notwithstanding the level of preparedness. I believe that level of preparedness is impressive and I agree with the previous speaker in that regard. The effort has been phenomenal across the political, administrative and diplomatic fronts. The engagement with business has been phenomenal. We have seen investment in infrastructure to deal with this reality. Yet, I have no doubt that there will be shortcomings and unforeseen events. There will be things that we have not countenanced and, in the early days of 2021, they will come sharply into focus.

I do not expect that we will get a green light from Brussels for any forbearance or light-touch regulation. Yet, the reality is that is what will be needed and I have no doubt that is what will happen. Someone will turn up without the right paperwork and we will have to take a practical approach to that. In effect, we will have to have a yellow card system. Those responsible will have to be told not to let it happen a second or third time. Otherwise, the reality is that we will have problems in Dublin Port. I visited the facilities there previously. If we take an approach that is not tolerant of the challenge we face on 1 January, then we could block up the entire port, the tunnel, the entire city and the distribution system. With a heavy hand, we could ensure product destined for supermarket shelves will never arrive. That is a possibility.

Our colleague in the Northern Ireland Executive, Edwin Poots, has referenced the reality that many retail outlets which have an international dimension, especially those with a UK dimension, may decide that there is no future for them in a post-Brexit scenario supplying either Northern Ireland or the Republic of Ireland. That is an unfortunate reality but a real possibility in the context of Brexit. We will need tolerance and forbearance from the Commission in how we deal with this transition period in the early days.

The negotiations are at a critical point. It is important to point out that we are the most impacted member state. Now is the time to ensure that we redouble our resolve to get the best possible deal and a negotiated settlement. That is critical. We need to remind Michel Barnier, who has been a fair-minded and accessible friend to Ireland in the context of these negotiations, of our unique position. We are an island on the periphery of Europe. We are the most exposed to the UK market, more than any other member state. In particular, it is important that we strengthen our resolve in the context of the fishing industry. Our exposure to UK waters is well documented. It has been put on the record of the House on numerous occasions. Now is the time to make that point again and again and emphasise it to the negotiating team.

It is also important we try to leverage as much as we possibly can from the new dispensation in the White House. The elephant in the room in the context of these negotiations is the statement by the British Prime Minister that he intends to reinstate the internal market proposals that were defeated in the House of Lords. The reality is that has the potential to shift the border from the Irish Sea to the island of Ireland, which is of course something we have always sought from day one to avoid. It is critical that every effort is made to ensure that the Biden Administration makes it abundantly clear, as I believe the President-elect has, and I congratulate him on his victory, that a UK-EU trade agreement is not a runner if it involves anything that undermines the Good Friday Agreement, the peace on our island and, in particular, the negotiated settlement which the UK regrettably appears to be willing to tear up in passing legislation in the House of Commons that is in breach of international law. That is alarming. It is the elephant in the room in the context of the legislation we are talking about because it would be a very significant game changer in terms of the painstaking negotiations that went into the withdrawal agreement and, in particular, the protocol on Northern Ireland.

Much has been said about the exposure of the agri-food industry, in particular to the UK, and that is true. Reference has also been made to getting our product to market, the land bridge, etc. These are all critical issues, and a lot has been done to try to mitigate the worst excesses of those problems, but we need to look beyond the immediate in the context of Brexit and see where the Irish agri-food industry needs to pitch its bid for new market opportunities in the context of diminished opportunities that will arise in the UK, notwithstanding our best efforts. A lot of good work has been achieved by the industry, working in tandem with the State, to find new market opportunities in recent years, in particular developing opportunities in the Asian market, China in particular. They are all welcome. They are, however, at a greater cost than markets closer to home. The most important market close to home, after the United Kingdom in the context of its membership of the European Union, is the rest of the European Union. We need to play to our strengths and our capacity to be an environmentally sustainable producer of high-quality product and go aggressively after the opportunities to displace other product in the European Union supermarket shelves with Irish product. A lot of effort is going into that. I appreciate the very significant increase in resources that has been ongoing for some years now to Bord Bia, but that is where the major opportunity is to secure additional market share without the opportunity costs, which are higher in markets that are further afield, where we have made great progress as well, particularly, as I said, in the Asian market, the Chinese market and in the Middle East and African markets. The European Union market, however, is the best market for us after the United Kingdom, and we need to redouble our efforts there.

I welcome the opportunity to say a few brief words on this. It was interesting that in the exit polls that were done following our election earlier this year, people said Brexit was a low priority for them. Brexit, as I said at the outset, will confront them in a very unfortunate way because there is no benign Brexit. Any Brexit is bad for Ireland. I hope we get a negotiated trade agreement but even that is not a benign Brexit.

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