Gerard Craughwell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

The UK's Supreme Court delivered its Brexit judgment this morning. There has been much focus on its implications for votes of the UK Parliament. Considerable attention has been drawn to the other aspects of the decision, in that the consent of the Northern Ireland and Scottish assemblies are not legally required before the Prime Minister can formally initiate Article 50.

There has been little focus on a key passage of the judgment, which I had the opportunity to read this morning, that had implications for the Good Friday Agreement. The UK Supreme Court was asked to consider this: "Does any provision of the NI Act, read together with the Belfast Agreement and the British-Irish Agreement, have the effect that primary legislation is required before Notice can be given?" According to the court at paragraph 131 of its judgment:

[It] is unquestionably right, however, to claim that the NI Act conferred rights on the citizens of Northern Ireland. Sections 6(2)(d) and 24(1), in imposing the EU constraints, have endowed the people of Northern Ireland with the right to challenge actions of the Executive or the Assembly on the basis that they are in breach of EU law.

While the court has ruled that the consent of the Northern Ireland Assembly was not required and it did not make judgment on the necessity or otherwise to amend the Northern Ireland Act of Westminster, which put into law the Good Friday Agreement, it made clear that Northern Ireland's citizens were given EU-based rights as a result of that legislation. Its citizens, the majority of whom voted against Brexit, will see those rights stripped away from them two years after the UK formally notifies of Article 50 without having any say on the matter. The citizens of this State, who voted in record numbers to amend our Constitution and enable Ireland to sign up to the Good Friday Agreement, will equally have no say over the stripping away of the rights enshrined in the Agreement. Yet we hear nothing from the Government as to what it intends to do to protect our Northern citizens' rights and prevent a unilateral breach of the Good Friday Agreement by the UK Government.

The Agreement was probably one of the greatest achievements in my lifetime in bringing peace and stability to this island, but the Government has no strategy to defend against its imminent destruction. This is not something that can wait to be kicked down the road, because it will then be too late. Once Article 50 is activated, the irrevocable process will have begun and essential clauses within the Good Friday Agreement that confer rights on Northern Irish citizens will vanish in two years' time with no recourse to protection.Amendment of the Good Friday Agreement is not the concern of the European Union. Neither is it a unilateral concern of the British state. It is the concern of Ireland, the United Kingdom and the elected members of the Northern Ireland Executive. The UK Prime Minister cannot ignore her obligations to this state and the Taoiseach cannot ignore its citizens who voted overwhelmingly in favour of ratification of the Good Friday Agreement. I, therefore, request the Leader to urge the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade, Deputy Charles Flanagan, to come to the House today to explain how the Government intends to defend every line of the Good Friday Agreement before the UK Prime Minister triggers Article 50. I propose that the Order of Business be amended to allow him to do so.