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

I thank the Taoiseach for his reply.

I was pleased the Taoiseach accepted my invitation to address the British-Irish Parliamentary Assembly. His attendance, both on Sunday evening and Monday morning, was much appreciated by all the participants from all the different legislatures. As the Taoiseach said, the focus of our particular plenary was on tourism. We were dealing with the opportunities there are for further development of our tourism product on an all-Ireland basis and throughout these islands. I was glad we had a specific presentation from the cross-Border UNESCO global geopark, which is based in the Cuilcagh Mountains on the Cavan-Fermanagh border. It was the first UNESCO global cross-Border geopark in the world and it has been a resounding success. Indeed, additional Government investment is going into that particular area which will be hugely beneficial for the south of Ulster and indeed the north-west region of our country. Our British colleagues were delighted to see that cross-Border work. Actually, thanks to the work of Arlene Foster as Minister for Tourism and me as a member of the Government back in 2008, we were able to get that project moved on and approved at the time with significant investment in the meantime.

Our Good Friday committee had a meeting with the Northern Ireland affairs committee of the House of Commons. One issue I again put to the British members was that thankfully, over the years successive taoisigh and Ministers for Foreign Affairs on our side have addressed our plenary meetings when they are held in Ireland. We do not have the same level of participation by senior British Ministers. We emphasised the need for the Prime Minister and senior Ministers in Britain to participate in the British-Irish Intergovernmental Conference and in the British-Irish Council. Successive Governments of ours have participated very willingly in all those discussions.

In regard to the funding that has been made available for developments in Northern Ireland, I am particularly interested in the A5 and the N2, which is important as part of my own constituency in County Monaghan, to our neighbours in Tyrone and to those in Donegal.

We are approaching the 50th anniversary of the terrible atrocities that were committed on our island on 17 May 1974. We have continually emphasised on every forum available to us the responsibility on the British Government to respond meaningfully to the unanimous request of this House in 2008, 2011 and 2016 to give access to an independent international eminent legal person to the relevant files and papers pertaining to the Dublin and Monaghan bombings. It is deplorable that the British Government has not responded to the request of our sovereign Parliament, iterated in this House and in the Seanad in 2008, 2011 and 2016. I want those issues pushed as strongly as possible.

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