Brendan Smith (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I compliment the Minister, Deputy Coveney, the Minister of State, Deputy Byrne, and their officials in the Department on preparing this legislation, and I know other Departments fed into it as well. This is important legislation and is welcome from many points of view. It ensures reciprocal access to health services for residents of Ireland in Britain, as Deputy Colm Burke has outlined in good detail. It ensures the European health insurance card for residents of Northern Ireland should they lose that facility when Britain exits on 1 January next. It continues the financial support for Irish third level students in British colleges. It maintains continuity of social protection arrangements in the common travel area. It protects employees in Ireland of a company that has been made insolvent in Britain. It enables extradition between Ireland and Britain when Britain leaves the European arrest warrant scheme.

These are issues we deal with daily and take for granted, but they are very important protections for our citizens. In barely seven weeks' time, Britain will be outside not just the European Union but, most importantly and very regrettably, outside the customs union and the Single Market. The trading and economic relationship between Ireland and Britain, which has been gradually and progressively aligning and harmonising for almost 50 years, will receive a cold, hard shock. Almost 50 years of progress will be substantially reversed, which has to be a cause of concern to all of us. Moving goods to and from Ireland and Britain will become more expensive and cumbersome, not to mention the added difficulties of trading goods with our EU partners when those goods must travel through the so-called landbridge that runs right through Britain.

It is not just about goods. Much of the economic and trade activity across the two islands is in services, increasingly so in recent years. The obstacles, costs and impediments to the trading of goods are replicated when it comes to trading services, with the added difficulty of data transfers, an area where there is increasing uncertainty. We have been seeing battles over the protection and integrity of personal data transferred to the US being played out in our courts. The two methods introduced to permit businesses to transfer the personal data of EU citizens to the US, Safe Harbor and Privacy Shield, have both been struck down. Could we face the same problems and difficulties in transferring data to Britain when Britain is outside the EU and no longer under the aegis of GDPR?

Our economy, unfortunately, is about to receive a major jolt, if not a seismic shock. With just seven weeks to go, we remain unsure as to the nature and construction of the new relationship. That is not the fault of anybody in our State or Government at political or official level. It is extraordinary that we cannot state with any certainty now, with only seven weeks to go, if there will be a post-Brexit deal between Britain and the European Union, never mind what it will contain. The Taoiseach and the Minister for Foreign Affairs have repeatedly said we anticipate there will be such a deal, and that is an important message to give out. I know there is very little else that can be said right now because, if the Government was to talk about a no-deal situation, it would be seized upon by the Brexiteers in the British Government as evidence that the EU just wants to punish England for having the temerity to leave the EU.

The delay in reaching agreement in negotiations is going to cause difficulty for businesses in my constituency and many other areas on both sides of the Border. We are working in the hope there will be some last-minute agreement on such outstanding issues as fishing and a level playing field, but we are also seeing deadline after deadline pass. The Minister, Deputy Coveney, attended the Committee on the Implementation of the Good Friday Agreement recently, where we all spoke about the need to implement the withdrawal agreement and the Ireland-Northern Ireland protocol, and not just implement them, but implement them in good faith. We know any agreement reached in the negotiations led by Michel Barnier and David Frost will need to go through a ratification process, yet we watch the clock tick down. It is worth asking just how sustainable and long-lasting any agreement reached in these stop-start talks with the representatives of the current British Government will be.

A British National Audit Office report on British border preparedness, which was published last week, makes it clear there will be significant disruption at the end of the transition period because of inadequate infrastructure and IT systems. The report also said there is a lack of preparation on the part of British businesses. What it does not say is how British businesses can be expected to prepare themselves for the post-1 January black hole when their own Government does not have a clue what it is doing or trying to achieve.

Irish businesses are being placed in a similar position, although the Irish Government and State agencies have been working hard, insofar as they can, to help businesses to prepare by offering their best assessment of what the situation will look like, and, very importantly, giving financial support to businesses to prepare.

After 1 January, all of us as public representatives will be inundated with questions about economic operator and registration identification numbers. These are, as Members know, the unique reference numbers that allow businesses to import from or export to countries outside the EU and which are required on all customs declaration forms. We will see the return of the customs broker, a job title we thought had gone the way of the glimmer man. Companies exporting goods will now have to have customs brokers and have a mechanism to pay the customs duty and the right information and documentation to support the importation of goods. How companies large and small do business is going to change. Almost no one running a business today has any muscle memory of operating customs processes. I know this will be a problem for all companies but, given the scale and capacity of larger companies to deal with this, it will be a much bigger issue for small to medium enterprises.

In a series of speeches here over the past few years both in plenary session in the Dáil and at various committees, I have set out in the starkest terms my anxieties about the many economic and social problems that Brexit heralds for my community and my region, both North and South. For the past three years, we have been feeling the early impact on the agri-food sector and we recall the huge difficulties the mushroom sector faced immediately after the Brexit referendum, when sterling fell in value. Similarly, the dairy industry, which is a major economic contributor across the Border region, with large producers such as Lakeland Dairies and others, sources the raw material from both sides of the Border. Thankfully, since 1998 we have witnessed a huge growth in the all-Ireland economy. Thankfully, today most of our major food businesses, whether dairy, pig meat, sheep meat or beef, are all-Ireland businesses. Those industries are true cross-border industries but they still face much uncertainty about how they will go about their day-to-day trading. Regarding raw product collected in one jurisdiction and processed in the other jurisdiction, what will be the mechanics and the modus operandi of getting that product to its destination for processing and then to its final destination and onto the shelf?

Our region and our communities are effectively being held hostage and used as leverage by a Tory Party driven by what we have to regard as Brexit madness. As I said here many times, this is not the action of a good neighbour. Last June, I said here in another debate that the Government must prepare for the worst and this Bill is an important further step in doing that. I commend the Government on producing such a wide-ranging and comprehensive omnibus Bill. It is a vital element in tackling the huge range of complex issues individuals and businesses alike will face post-Brexit transition. Its aim is clear: to reduce as far as we practically can the impact of the post-Brexit situation on Irish businesses and ameliorate the disturbance that Brexit will bring. There was an understandable wariness about moving too quickly in that direction in the forlorn hope that sense might prevail in Westminster. As we can see, it has not. The careless and reckless abandon that Mr. Johnson's Government has shown to its neighbours in Europe, not to mention his mendacious approach to his responsibilities under the Good Friday Agreement, will take years to repair. Future British Governments will find themselves having to undo the damage inflicted by Mr. Johnson, Mr. Gove, Mr. Raab and their colleagues, just as President-elect Biden must undo some of the damage caused by his predecessor. Indeed, the election of Joe Biden reinforces the message sent by such great friends of Ireland and the Good Friday Agreement as the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, Congressman Richie Neal and Congressman Brendan Boyle that Britain will not be allowed to shirk its responsibilities to the Good Friday Agreement.

It is important to put on the record in our discussions here that American support for the Good Friday Agreement comes from both sides of the aisle. It comes from Members of Congress and Senators from both the Democratic and the Republican Parties. It is important to put on the record also that a motion passed in the US House of Representatives in December 2018 was a cross-party one which called on the British Government to ensure that in leaving the EU, no damage would be done to the Good Friday Agreement.

I complement again the Minister, Deputy Coveney, and the Minister of State, Deputy Byrne, and the officials in their Department and in other Departments on preparing this necessary legislation. It would be great if we did not need this legislation but it is an important protection to have in place should Britain leave the EU without a deal but we sincerely hope that will not be the situation.

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