Aodhán Ó Ríordáin (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister for this important debate. The vote by the British people is nothing short of an unmitigated disaster. I have not been as depressed about a political event in a considerable time. It proves that if one decides to focus one's attention on a disenfranchised or disconnected group of people and tells them anything one wishes to conjure up in one's head and point at another group of people and say they are the problem, one can secure a political win.I fear for politics internationally. Austria came within an ace of electing a far-right President. We can see in America and even here that the centre ground is being hollowed out and the people and the political discourse are going to the far left and far right. It seems anything can be said and a victimhood mentality rules the day across Europe and in Ireland.

Much of the debate centred on immigration. People in this House do not have any right to be sniffy or to pretend that such a debate could not happen here in Ireland. The very first election I ran in was the local election in 2004 which coincided with an unnecessary referendum on citizenship promoted by Fianna Fáil and the Progressive Democrats and supported by Fine Gael which brought out some pretty nasty emotions. We have not had any general election centred on the issue of immigration but let us not pretend that cannot happen in the future because it happened on that occasion.

I worry about the European project because it was a collection of European nations standing together to collectively face the issues of the world, issues that affect the global South, climate change and the refugee crisis, for example. The British people have effectively said they want to turn their back on those issues. How can we now face these world issues collectively and effect some change? It is devastating and disappointing that this has come to pass. British politics is in terminal decline. Both mainstream parties are in a massive state of disintegration. Now is the time for us, while talking about commerce, trade, tariffs, exports and imports, and financial considerations to do so on a humanitarian basis. The EU was founded because the people of Europe said they could not let the continent descend into war again but we have returned to a situation where extremist rhetoric is winning the day, where the emotions of people who feel disaffected with mainstream society can be stirred up and a faceless enemy can be identified and becomes the basis for a political win. Victimhood is winning the day. There are very serious questions to be answered and reflection to be had about what we stand for in this Republic. If the only rhetoric we come up with is based on tariffs and trade, economics and money, we have missed the point because the European project was born out of a sense of despair about where humanity was going. I have that sense of despair now so can we please readjust our rhetoric to talk about humanity and our collective response to the global issues of the day and stand up for what is decent and right? Ireland is in a particularly good place to do that.