Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Aontú) | Oireachtas source

Is deas an rud é an Taoiseach a fheiceáil iomlán folláin. Guím gach rath ar cheannaire nua an Lucht Oibre freisin. It is hard to remember any time since the Good Friday Agreement when the political infrastructure in the North of Ireland was in such chaos. In the North today, there are 44,000 people on housing waiting lists and 250,000 people have been on health waiting lists for more than a year. That is one in seven people in the North of Ireland. Some 300,000 men, women and children are living in poverty in the North. A cost-of-living crisis is engulfing families every day yet the Executive charged with fixing the situation is crashed.

For the government of any society that is dealing with such a confluence of crises to be suspended would not be tolerated in any other democracy in the world. The truth of the matter is that the Good Friday Agreement has been gutted. The Executive is not working at all. The North-South Ministerial Council, which was a significant reason for nationalists to support the Good Friday Agreement, is not working either. There is no sign of resolution. The DUP states that if nationalists hold the position of First Minister after the elections, they may not hold the position of Deputy First Minister. Shockingly, even after the people of the North get to cast their votes on 5 May, the DUP is stating that it may not return to any Executive. The DUP has approximately 8% of the vote in the island of Ireland.

It is polling at about 19% of the vote in the North of Ireland at the moment. A total of 85% of the population of Ireland, North and South, voted for the Good Friday Agreement. Such an obvious violation of the democratic will of the people would not be tolerated in any other democracy on the planet. Right now, in the streets, the UDA and UVF are still active, yet British Government officials are still meeting with them and the DUP considers them stakeholders. Today, we learned that the Northern Ireland Secretary, Brandon Lewis, has said he will not bring forward Irish language legislation in Westminster before May's assembly elections. This Irish language Act has been promised for 15 years. Indeed, Sinn Féin returned to Stormont in January 2020 after previously collapsing the Executive because it said it had achieved an Irish language Act. In a combination of bad faith by London and naivete from Sinn Féin, we found out this morning that the commitment was hocus-pocus all along.

The British and Irish Governments are co-guarantors of the Good Friday Agreement but both Governments are not co-guaranteeing anything at the moment. The Government is sitting on its hands, keeping its head down and hoping the crisis will go away. It cannot be ignored any longer. The Taoiseach was in Washington two weeks ago. The White House is one of the few cards we have in terms of leverage to protect the Good Friday Agreement.

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