Feargal Quinn (Independent)

I congratulate the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Deputy Dermot Ahern, on his birthday today. I gather that means I will not see him at my speech at a function in Dundalk tonight but he will be in our thoughts.

Rather than concentrate on the Minister's speech, I will mention two or three examples of how we can do something in this part of our island that will help in the years to come. Some years ago I was accompanied by a company colleague when I went to buy a wedding present from a shop in Grafton Street. When I decided to buy some linen that came from Northern Ireland, my colleague from south of Dublin asked why I did not buy something of our own. I realised then that, having had parents who came from Northern Ireland, I regarded the North as part of our own and it had not dawned on me not to regard linen from Northern Ireland as anything but our own. When my company decided to identify products made in Ireland by putting a shamrock on the shelf opposite such products, I was asked by some people whether products from Northern Ireland should be labelled with the shamrock. It never dawned on me not to do so. My reason for mentioning those incidents is that I believe we need an attitude change down here because those of us who believe in a united island of Ireland still think, somewhere at the back of our minds, in terms of them and us.

Perhaps one thing we can do is to encourage people to visit Northern Ireland. In November I went to the North to speak at the British Council of Shopping Centres conference, which was the biggest conference ever to take place in Belfast. The more than 2,000 people who turned up for the conference had come mainly from Britain but what they saw was a new Belfast. I travel to the the North quite frequently to visit relatives, but on this occasion I spent four days doing all the tourist things. I believe it would be of huge benefit if the State encouraged its citizens to travel to the North and to mix with people there because part of what I learned there came from meeting people I would not normally have met. At the Hilton Hotel, I asked the porter or concierge, George, where I could eat. He directed me to a restaurant round the corner, where the waitress was called Victoria. I asked her whether she knew someone who could show us round Belfast, so she got us a taxi driver called Walter. The very names George, Victoria and Walter suggested to me that they did not come from the same background as mine. It was also clear to me that they seldom met people who come from my background, religion and tradition. I believe it would be of immense benefit for the long-term future of the relationships between the North and the rest of the country if we could find reasons to visit the North, which is actually a smashing place for tourism. I know great work is being done and that now, much more so than in the past, people are being encouraged to visit the North. The attractive advertising that is now being used is not only good value for money but is useful in the long term. It would be very useful in terms of the long-term peace on this island if we could get to know those Northerners much better than we have in the past and if we could give them the chance to meet us to express ideas in a convivial atmosphere even if it is only in a pub, a golf club or otherwise. Let us think that through. We need a change of attitude down here. We can do something about it ourselves and the benefit will be long-standing.