Seanad debates

Wednesday, 11 March 2009

Order of Business (Resumed).

 

10:30 am

Photo of Joe O'TooleJoe O'Toole (Independent)

Tá deacracht agam leis an Order of Business don lá inniu, agus ceapaim gur cheart dhá uair a chloig do bheith againn don díospóireacht ar an nGaeilge. Níl ach aon uair agus ceathrú a chloig againn, agus braithim go bhfuil sé sin ró ghairid. I believe it should be extended to two hours. Perhaps there is a problem with this, but if so we need to hear about it. It certainly needs to be extended somewhat further.

Yesterday, as Senator Fitzgerald has said, there was very strong support across all parties and groups all over the country for condemnation of the atrocities in the North. We now need to focus on positive elements. Among the issues we need to look at are the positive impacts of the Good Friday Agreement and how these affect society. We are not doing enough in this regard. To take a simple example, the North-South Ministerial Council is based in Armagh. I must declare an interest here in that I chaired the parliamentary liaison group of Co-operation Ireland, and we were in regular contact with these people. We recently had a meeting with the North-South Ministerial Council in Armagh. One of the positive things I learned, of which I was not previously aware, is that there are meetings going on all the time between Ministers in the Republic and their counterparts in the North. Such discussions are being held every week. Every time a Minister in the North has any engagement with the ministerial council or with a Minister in the Republic, he or she reports to the Stormont Assembly, so people are engaging with the process. I have never heard in ten years about any report of such engagement except for the odd mention on television. I suggest the Seanad is the appropriate place in which something like that could be done regularly with reports being discussed in this House as regards what takes place.

It is also important to recognise the types of initiatives that are going on. There are obvious, practical, physical things people can see such as the Inland Waterways Association of Ireland, which is probably the most effective of the bodies established, looking after the waterways all over this island. There are other things, too. Along the Border there are many local authority bodies liaising with cross-Border groups, particularly in areas such as Monaghan, Fermanagh and Cavan. Those are the ones I know of, but there are probably others as well. They meet regularly with their colleagues on either side of the Border and focus on local issues. Party politics does not come into it, and neither does unionism nor nationalism. People need to be aware such things are happening and we need to have them recorded and discussed.

It is not just a clear choice, therefore, between the shooting of soldiers and policemen with nothing being done on the other side. Much is happening on the ground and we need to hear about issues such as Garda co-operation. Are people aware, for instance, of the Centre for Autism in Middletown County Armagh, which is supported by both governments and which has people in it from both the Republic and the North? It takes children from Waterford to Antrim, in terms of dealing with these issues. These initiatives are not being presented as the products of peace and the type of things on which we can build for the future, and they should be.

There are other issues in the Good Friday Agreement such as the development of special education and health as well as cross-Border supports that could be taking place, and we should be focusing on those. I do not want to go into further detail apart from saying this is an issue of positivity that needs to be recorded, recognised, acknowledged and developed. We need to discuss these matters in the Seanad so people know there are positives in the peace process, apart from the fact of people not losing their lives.

Finally, I hope we will not pay the price for both governments over the last ten years reducing to almost nothing the grant aid they had previously given to groups such as Co-operation Ireland, which are involved in developing cross-community initiatives deep into the communities. We need to foster new interest in that regard to ensure these earlier initiatives are re-invented.

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