Rose Conway Walsh (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister for being present. I will not use any of my notes. I left Mayo at a very young age when I was forced to emigrate. I know what it is like to be one of the diaspora. I apologise for not being present earlier for the debate but I had to attend a very tragic funeral in Bray. I know what it was like to be forced to leave home in the first place and then what it was like to be told that one’s opinion did not matter and that one had no say whatsoever in the running of one’s country. That was in the 1980s when everything was happening here. I was an Irish citizen abroad without a vote or a voice and I had to make my own way, which I did.

I go abroad quite a lot. I go to England and America and I hear the same story over and over again. People want to have a say. They do not want to be patted on the back or told that people care about the diaspora. Not everybody wants to have a say but there are many who do. I come from a family of nine and my brother who spent time in America but came home could vote in the recent US presidential election, but somebody from Ireland living abroad cannot vote here. There is no longer any excuse for people abroad not to be given a vote. If the motion is defeated I do not know how the message that would go out today from Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil could be explained to the diaspora. I do not know how after all those years they could say to those people that they must wait another while before they have a say in the running of their country. I appeal to both parties to see sense on the issue and to do something once and for all to show that we really respect Irish citizens who are part of the diaspora no matter where they live.