Joe O'Reilly (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I make these remarks today as a Border representative, as somebody from the Cavan-Monaghan constituency, who lives close to the Border where we have many ties of kinship north of the Border. I wish to publicly appeal through this House to our Northern friends right across the divide, who are hard-headed, shrewd business people with a particular business culture, to look twice at this agreement before they decide to reject it. I ask them to look at the fact that their constitutional position is not threatened. There is no threat to the integrity of the constitutional position of Northern Ireland. There is a legal acceptance of the Good Friday Agreement, which ultimately means there must be a popular mandate to undo the constitutional position of Northern Ireland.

First, there is no threat. Nothing changes there and nothing will change there. Second, the deal gives the people of Northern Ireland access to the EU and to every benefit the EU confers, bearing in mind that the North voted to remain. It gives them access to the customs union, to trade and to all the benefits. Third, it gives them unfettered access to UK markets in a post-Brexit situation. It would be an economic bonanza for Northern Ireland in that it would leave it the best of both worlds and put it into a solvent position. Our hard-headed and good friends in Ulster will have to look at this question. I sincerely appeal to them to do that. They should bear in mind that the alternative means an impoverishment of Ulster, which ultimately will impoverish the existing Northern Ireland State and will make its hinterland poor because it will lower people's capacity to buy, trade and do business with the Republic. That is a very serious implication also.

My basic point is that people in Northern Ireland should look twice at the deal and consider accepting it. I appeal to all sides in Northern Ireland to get the Assembly up and running again because if there is anything that highlights that lacuna and the need for a domestic administration in Northern Ireland it is the current goings on.The people of Northern Ireland should view this from the perspective of their own interests. They should realise there is no threat to their future and that this gives them the best of all worlds.