Joe O'Reilly (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The protocol is an international agreement and that must be the starting point. It was negotiated between the EU and the UK. It is not something we negotiated, but an international treaty between the EU and the UK. It must be seen as such. As Senator Ó Donnghaile said, it stands alongside the EU-UK Trade and Cooperation Agreement in that regard. They are inter-changeable and connected.

What is interesting, and the Minister and colleagues in the House are very aware of this, is that some of the political people in Northern Ireland are so out of sync with and unconnected to the reality of what ordinary people, business people, the trade associations and the commercial sector in Northern Ireland think. They want to work the protocol and to see the great opportunity, which I will mention briefly momentarily. First, the ordinary people of Northern Ireland voted not to accept Brexit. Having voted against Brexit, they now want to work the protocol. One can only say that there is a cynical exploitation and that the people of Northern Ireland are almost like pawns in a game that they are not part of and do not wish to be part of. They want to work the protocol. The alternative to the protocol was a hard border and the obvious threat that would be to peace, the Good Friday Agreement and the welfare of the island. It does not require further elaboration. No Member of the House is unaware of that. Suggestions that perhaps technological solutions were possible are nonsense. Ultimately, it was going to lead to violence and trouble there. That must be remembered.

The protocol is a great opportunity for Northern Ireland in that it gives it the capacity to trade efficiently with the UK and similarly to have its status, membership and trading capacity here between the North and the South and into the EU. There has been a great expansion of North-South trade and that is a very important development. It is an exciting development on a number of fronts and it is great. It is a by-product of all this.

We should recognise that Commission Vice-President Maroš Šefovi made very generous and workable proposals. If I understand them correctly, and I presume the Minister mentioned this earlier and will perhaps mention it again in summarising, they remove about 80% of the potential difficulties of the protocol in terms of checks, customs checks and trading difficulties. There is a real effort on the EU's side in that regard. I hope that the UK will refrain from the nuclear option, as it were, of Article 16, and I believe it will. Our major appeal here is that we all be sensible and calm and that we negotiate. I know that is what the Minister will do, but I wish to repeat that it is desire of this House, my desire, the desire of the Brexit select committee and the desire of all rational people that an accommodation be found, that there be negotiation and reasoned argument and that we sit down together to make things work to the benefit of the people in Northern Ireland. We must stop short of any grandstanding or anything that would lead to trade wars and so forth.

The protocol is in the best interests of all the people of Northern Ireland, the economy of Northern Ireland, the all-island economy and, ultimately, of the UK and the EU. First, if there is a message I wish to give to the Minister, it is that we endorse it.It is a consistent theme in all of the contributions made today that we support the protocol. It is an international agreement but we do want to support negotiation, we do want a reasoned outcome, we do not want confrontation and we do want the best interests of the people of Northern Ireland to be the ultimate arbiter of how we go about this. The best interests of Northern Ireland certainly lie with the Šefovi proposals and with further modifications to ensure we have smooth trade North, South, east and west. We must avoid anything that would contribute to polarisation or flashpoints. All of that is a consistent theme and I welcome this important debate.

It is great there is consensus, unanimity and clarity in the House. It is a reasoned approach that we must continue ultimately for the welfare of ordinary people in Northern Ireland. We want to ensure their incomes, livelihoods, way of life, and supply of goods and quality of life remain intact. We also must ensure there is a respect for the fact they did not, in the first instance, vote for Brexit and voted against it, and that there is a respect for the fact the great majority of people there want to work the protocol. Ultimately, those people should be the arbiters of our direction. I favour a negotiated, peaceful and reasoned approach, trying to arrive at a consensus and us offering an olive branch where we can.