Michael McDowell (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State for being here and I thank all the Members of the House from right across the political spectrum for their participation in this debate. I will make a couple of points, if I may. Senator Mullen and I might disagree on one point.The Minister of State was succinct in his responses. His senior colleague is not as succinct sometimes. The Minister of State departed from the script in one important respect. He stated that it is no part of the Government's policy or intention to discourage Members of the Oireachtas from having engagement with Taiwanese officials or Taiwanese people. That is very important. It is a very big step forward because we had not heard that before. It is nice to have it confirmed. I remind the House that Members of this House were told by the Chairman of the Houses of the Oireachtas Commission that:

Active engagement between members of the Oireachtas and Taiwan can damage the relations between Ireland and China and is in conflict to the long-standing One China policy. As Ceann Comhairle, I have no intention of telling Oireachtas members who they, as elected public representatives, can meet or what functions they can attend. That would never be my wish. However, I am aware that there continues to be engagement between some Oireachtas members and the Taiwanese authorities. This can cause serious offence and grave concern to our Chinese friends and has the potential to cause serious damage to Ireland’s developing relationship with China as well as being a danger to Ireland’s national interest.

That is what he wrote. I am glad that this occasion now puts the nail firmly through that letter. It is out of order. This House has freedoms. The Government has at last come to our aid and stated that we are free to speak our minds on this issue.

People speak about the Chinese economic miracle, and it has been a miracle. However, I remind the House that, in the context of Taiwan, when the nationalists fled, having been defeated in the Chinese civil war, and landed on that island, there was nothing there. It was almost a barren rock of a place. The Taiwanese miracle is tremendous too. I wish to put that on the record lest people think that somehow it was some little enclave of wealth. The Taiwanese people built something out of nothing, practically speaking.

Having complimented the Minister of State, I wish to also compliment the people who helped him with his speech, because they dealt with the fact that there is a European Union representative office in Taipei. He stated that IDA Ireland and Enterprise Ireland have regional offices. Those bodies do not have offices in Taipei. I think it is serviced from Singapore, Tokyo or somewhere else nowhere near Taipei. It was Rudyard Kipling who wrote about the well-weighed answer that tells the blacker lie. I am not accusing the Minister of State of lying, but I am saying that I spoke to people on the ground there and Irish diplomats have nothing whatsoever to do with the EU representative office in Taipei. Just saying that it is there is fine and saying that it is open to Irish industrialists is fine but I am telling the House that Ireland is the weakest and most cowardly behind the door in making use of that European facility. I reiterate the remarks of Senator Wilson in respect of the situation of the EU. We share the values of the people of Taiwan. We share their aims. We are on their side. Irish MEPs are not afraid to say so when speaking in the European Parliament and we should not be afraid to say so when we speak in this Parliament.

Reference was made to Tibet. As Senators will appreciate, it is an autonomous region of the People's Republic of China. Xinjiang province was an autonomous region. This just underlines the absolute disparity between truthfulness and the labels which a Marxist-Leninist regime can use in its language. I reiterate that President Xi and nobody else spoke about the importance of population proportion throughout the whole of China and stated that the disproportion in population was a danger to Chinese interests. That means, in effect, that the Chinese authorities do not like Uighur Muslims having large families and will prevent them from doing so, sterilise their women, separate the men from the women and bring in the Han population and settle them in Xinjiang province. That is genocide of a sort and it is nothing else.

The debate today has been valuable. It is not simply a group of Senators speaking about something where there could be no opposition. It is important that the Government has told us here that it supports our right to engage with the people of Taiwan. It is important that Senator Wilson and the other Members have contributed. Senator Wilson reminded us that the European Parliament has stated where the EU stands on Taiwan. It is about time that message was really sunk into the marrow of Iveagh House. It needs to be European, adopt what Europe says about Taiwan, live by European values in the context of Taiwan, and stop being timid in respect of Taiwan.