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Brexit Issues

Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 5 December 2018

Wednesday, 5 December 2018

Ceisteanna (3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8)

Seán Haughey

Ceist:

3. Deputy Seán Haughey asked the Taoiseach if he will report on the outcome of the special European Council meeting held in Brussels in November 2018 to consider the Brexit issue. [50056/18]

Amharc ar fhreagra

Joan Burton

Ceist:

4. Deputy Joan Burton asked the Taoiseach if he will report on the EU summit held on 25 November 2018. [50349/18]

Amharc ar fhreagra

Joan Burton

Ceist:

5. Deputy Joan Burton asked the Taoiseach if he has spoken to Prime Minister May since the EU summit on 25 November 2018 and to the other heads of state. [50351/18]

Amharc ar fhreagra

Eamon Ryan

Ceist:

6. Deputy Eamon Ryan asked the Taoiseach if he has spoken to Mr. Jean-Claude Juncker since he met Prime Minister May on 21 November 2018; and the issues that were discussed. [50479/18]

Amharc ar fhreagra

Eamon Ryan

Ceist:

7. Deputy Eamon Ryan asked the Taoiseach if he will report on meetings he had at the special meeting in Brussels on 25 November 2018. [50480/18]

Amharc ar fhreagra

Mary Lou McDonald

Ceist:

8. Deputy Mary Lou McDonald asked the Taoiseach if he will report on the recent special meeting of the European Council. [50556/18]

Amharc ar fhreagra

Freagraí ó Béal (17 píosaí cainte)

I propose to take Questions No. 3 to 8, inclusive, together.

I attended the special meeting of the European Council in Brussels on 25 November. At our meeting, we endorsed the withdrawal agreement and approved the political declaration. This was a positive step, representing the culmination of more than 20 months of difficult negotiations.

The withdrawal agreement sets out the terms for the UK’s withdrawal from the European Union. It ensures the withdrawal will happen in an orderly manner, avoiding the United Kingdom crashing out, with all the severe consequences that would imply. It provides for a period of transition, during which detailed negotiations on the future relationship between the EU and the UK can take place. It provides for the rights of UK nationals currently resident in other EU member states and EU citizens resident in the UK. It also provides for the orderly winding down of current arrangements across a broad spectrum of EU co-operation and it sets out the financial settlement and governance structures for the withdrawal.

The protocol on Ireland and Northern Ireland, which is an integral and fully legally operational part of the withdrawal agreement, fully protects the Good Friday Agreement and peace. It translates the commitment to avoiding a hard border into a legal guarantee.

As I have said many times, I hope the backstop will never be needed but it is vital the withdrawal agreement contains this essential insurance policy, which is a fallback option should other options fail. The protocol also contains provisions on other important areas for Ireland, including the maintenance of the common travel area and all the rights, freedoms and benefits for citizens that flow from it, North-South co-operation, and the single electricity market on the island of Ireland.

The backstop also ensures there will be no diminution of rights, safeguards or equality of opportunity as set out in the Good Friday Agreement and it confirms the people in the North will continue to enjoy rights as EU citizens, as I explained earlier. Importantly for Northern Ireland and the Border counties, it confirms PEACE and INTERREG funding will continue.

I had no formal bilateral meetings in Brussels on 25 November but engaged en marge with many of my EU counterparts, including Chancellor Merkel, President Tusk, President Juncker and Prime Minister May. I also spoke to President Juncker by phone on Friday, 23 November, two days before the summit. I thanked him for the continued solidarity and work of the Commission and I assented to the course of action he proposed.

There is no Brexit outcome that will be good for Ireland or the EU. I welcome the withdrawal agreement ratified in Brussels. It represents the best way forward from the point of view of avoiding a hard border on the island of Ireland and for protecting the Good Friday Agreement. I also welcome the unfailing support for the Irish position shown by the other 26 EU member states. A vote will take place in the House of Commons on 11 December. I am conscious we should not say anything on this side of the water to interfere in that process. I guess the Taoiseach does not want to say anything about the legal advice to the UK Government on the Brexit deal, which was just published.

We are in for a period of uncertainty. It is clear there is no plan B under consideration, so uncertainty prevails. It would seem we are in for a rocky road ahead or we certainly could be. Are we prepared for Brexit? Are we prepared for all eventualities and scenarios? Are we upgrading our ports and airports? Are we providing sufficient supports to businesses and SMEs to be Brexit ready? We now have the withdrawal agreement. The future relationship will have to be negotiated. Is Ireland actively engaged in preparing for these new negotiations on the future relationship? What work has been done in that regard in the context of working with the European Commission?

Yesterday in the discussions in the British Parliament, Mrs. May stated the backstop would have to be short term. She stated the EU would not allow it to remain for long because the EU would not want the UK to have access to EU markets for an indeterminate period of time. The explanation by Mrs May, notwithstanding the enormous support we have received from other EU member countries, has to be of concern to us in the context that if the backstop was to disappear, as people such as those in the DUP would like, it would leave the North and South very exposed if there were no alternative arrangements. In that context, has the Taoiseach had any opportunities to discuss what might happen? The opinion of the Advocate General of the European Court of Justice is possibly very helpful to us. It seems to me Mrs. May is now being boxed into a corner where she is offering a fairly quick withdrawal from the backstop and is not clear about the alternatives. The implications for the North and the South are pretty worrying.

It is impossible to work out what will happen with regard to Brexit following the vote next week in the House of Commons. I was in Westminster last week talking to my colleague, Caroline Lucas, from the Green Party, who is involved in the People's Vote campaign. We support it while being respectful from a distance. I do not believe there can or should be any reopening of the deal that is on offer.

There is one variation I want to put to the Taoiseach as a possible addition to what is available or as a possibility the Taoiseach might consider. It is related to the Advocate General's advice that it is possible to stall Article 50. One alternative, if it becomes useful to use it, is to offer a backstop guarantee for the UK.

It could work in the following way. At the end of a transition period, should the UK decide at any stage to rejoin the European Union, we could commit to or try to get agreement among the European Union Council to that outcome without the usual strictures around having to join the currency or changing the voting system or any other such measures. We could give the UK a backstop guarantee such that if, at the end of the transition period, it is not working out, then the UK can rejoin easily, quickly and at no cost. That might give the UK some space or help the political situation. Lord knows how that will evolve in the coming weeks, but that may help as one of the options. Would the Taoiseach consider that? Would he share the idea with his European Union colleagues and consider putting forward the idea, if needs be, in the coming weeks?

I wish to place on the record my agreement with Deputy Boyd Barrett in respect of the changes to the personal independence payment and universal credit. The moves have been seriously damaging to working and vulnerable people. I remind the Deputy that, believe it or not, this scenario would have been far worse but for mitigation that was secured. That is not to defend those responsible but it is a function of ongoing British jurisdiction and the fact that the Tories are in government.

I do not believe we should make the mistake of going down the line of imagining, as Deputy Burton has, that the backstop disappears. The backstop will not be disappearing. It is clear to me from the legal advice that has been provided that the backstop stays in place unless and until, which is the wording. We should not get into a false discussion or give succour to those who would wish to ditch the backstop. If there is no backstop, there is no withdrawal agreement – sin é. That has been enunciated clearly and that line has been held.

The only circumstances in which we do not have a backstop are, of course, in the event of a crash. Whereas there is no majority for that, we cannot discount that it may happen. I am making the point to the Taoiseach more for him to have it in his line of thought rather than anything else. In addition to preparation for Brexit and the immediacy of that, we need to be mindful that, in the event of a crash, no hardening of the Border would be tolerable. We cannot philosophically sit back and simply absorb the damage that would arise. In such circumstances we would have to look to the scenario of removing the Border, that is to say, a border poll, a referendum, and putting the constitutional question. It is important the Government has this in its line of sight as well.

I will respond briefly to the point made by Deputy McDonald. I am glad she accepts that these are obnoxious so-called reforms. They are vile intrusions and cuts on particularly vulnerable people. To my mind they have to be resisted full stop. Mitigation is not enough. This is appalling. These are private companies - those involved not even medical practitioners - telling people whether they are entitled to disability support. It is disgusting. There is a lesson for us. We must not go down that road.

I accept that, as Deputy Burton said, it has not happened here yet, but we must not allow it to happen. Sinn Féin should not have passed that Bill. This is the point about whether Stormont is in place. We have to resist these measures regardless of who is in government and regardless of the Administration that is in place because these measures are vile and obnoxious. This is not welfare reform. Rather, it is an assault on the most vulnerable people in society.

I wish to make one brief point about issues that get obscured by all of this. I asked about this matter yesterday. I believe the yellow jackets protest to be an absolutely justified protest against fuel hikes in France. To what extent is the Taoiseach discussing this question with his European colleagues? We need urgent radical action on climate change but we must also ensure that action does not hit at vulnerable low-income people and rather is directed at the big polluters, including the fossil fuel industry and so on. It goes against what we are trying to do to allow public transport fares in this country to increase at a time when we need to get people out of their cars and into public transport.

There is not much to be achieved by trying to discern any final outcome from the chaos in Westminster at the moment. There are many different groups and constantly shifting coalitions. For example, the vote yesterday on the Dominic Grieve amendment was interesting. It saw European-positive Tory MPs, who will mostly support the deal, vote with the UK Opposition while the deal's most bitter opponents actually supported the Government. The week's events raise serious issues. We have also seen the Keir Starmer parliamentary manoeuvres in forcing the publication of the advice of the UK Attorney General. In many ways this illustrates the strength of the British Parliament, its parliamentary tradition and its power vis-à-vis the UK Executive. It is something we might look at here.

I put it to the Taoiseach that the advice of the British Attorney General is now published. I gather we are waiting for the European legal advice and it is due in the coming period. Should our own Attorney General's advice not be published given the unique circumstances governing this issue? It is a serious issue for all concerned. The Taoiseach indicated to me that the EU legal service will make a statement at some stage about the legal implications of the withdrawal treaty. It might be useful if we had our own advice.

I accept that, as the British Attorney General pointed out, there is a political dimension and a legal dimension. He made the point that the backstop can never be permanent while at the same time saying that the UK could be trapped because of EU law and so on. He then made the strong point that, politically, there will be a desire to have an agreement and suggested that we should look at the positive side of that. Nonetheless, it would be helpful if we were to reflect on what is happening in Westminster in terms of the power of parliament there and compare it with what is happening in this Parliament in terms of access to important advice.

The Taoiseach has 29 seconds to respond.

I am not sure if the UK Parliament is an example we want to follow given the chaos we are seeing in Westminster.

That is politics. It is not the UK Parliament.

The agreement we have took 18 months to negotiate. It is 500 pages long and 28 Governments agreed to it. The suggestion that somehow, if it is defeated, we would find ourselves negotiating with a parliament really is quite unworkable. The idea of a parliamentary delegation entering the tunnel to reopen the talk is not feasible.

I did not say that. Stop the ráiméis.

I appreciate Deputy Martin did not say that but that is how some people could interpret one of the motions passed yesterday. When it comes to legal advice from the Attorney General, it is my strong view that legal advice should be privileged. It is the case with the legal advice provided to many people that it should be privileged to those who receive it.

Deputy Haughey also asked about the legal advice of the UK Attorney General. I am not in a position to comment on it because I have been here for two hours and the advice was only published in the past two hours. I hope to get a chance to read it tonight sometime. In any event, I doubt it will be fundamentally different from what the UK Attorney General outlined in the House of Commons the other day. We did something similar with the eighth amendment. We are willing to produce summaries of the Attorney General's legal advice. That is what the UK Attorney General did and the summary came across as sound to me. It will be interesting to see if there is any significant or meaningful difference between what he released and what comes out today. We will see that when we see it.

Deputy Haughey also asked if we are actively preparing for the future relationship talks. The answer is "Yes". In fact, we used the opportunity of the summit in Brussels to undertake a round of the 27 Prime Ministers and Presidents to express our priorities, particular interests and concerns for the future relationship. As Deputies can imagine, these are all the ideas we would expect. People want there to be free and frictionless trade with the UK in the future relationship, but people also want to ensure that is linked to a level playing field on environmental standards, labour rights, workers’ rights and so on. There is particular concern around fisheries. Many coastal states, including Ireland, are concerned about the impact on our fisheries industry. As someone who hails from a seafaring background and family, I know Deputy Haughey will have a particular interest in that too.

I am a landlubber.

He will also have an interest in guarding the interests of our fishermen, who take many of their most valuable catches, including mackerel, shrimp and prawns, from UK waters.

That work is under way.

Many people also expressed the view that, given that the Barnier task force model had worked very well as the agent in negotiating for the 28 member states, we should have a similar model for the future relationship and treaty talks. It may not be headed by Michel Barnier, but the model of a task force to represent the 28 member states and the institutions of the European Union might work better than the alternative where the Commission, the Council and different European governments try to carry out different bits of the negotiations. The task force model seems to have been very successful.

Deputy Eamon Ryan asked about the views of the Scottish First Minister, Nicola Sturgeon, and the Welsh First Minister, Carwyn Jones. We discussed the backstop, on which they gave their views. It is important to bear in mind where they are both coming from. They both voted to remain and would like the United Kingdom to remain in the European Union. However, they both know that that is probably impractical at this stage. They both have a particular perspective of the backstop, one that we do not often hear here, but it is heard in the United Kingdom. They have a concern that the backstop actually confers an economic advantage on Northern Ireland businesses and exporters that will place them at an advantage over those in Scotland and Wales and raises the possibility that trade might be diverted from the Dublin to Holyhead route to the Larne to Stranraer route. That is one of the reasons Northern Ireland businesses came out in favour of the backstop. They see that what we have negotiated could be of economic benefit to Northern Ireland in terms of jobs, the economy and living standards. It is always interesting to get the perspectives of others.

Deputy Eamon Ryan also asked about the possibility of inserting a rejoining provision, which would allow the United Kingdom to rejoin the European Union on the same terms. While that would have been worthy of consideration at the time, the United Kingdom did not want such a provision because, as far as it was concerned, it was negotiating a withdrawal treaty; it was leaving and not coming back. It did not want to entertain discussion of a rejoining provision, but there were mixed views on the idea at EU level. If the United Kingdom was ever to decide to rejoin, I would celebrate and welcome it back in the way one would welcome home an old friend. However, some other EU countries believe the United Kingdom already receives special treatment, including a rebate other countries do not receive, an opt-out from the euro, among other opt-outs in the area of home and justice affairs. Many countries take the view that if the United Kingdom decides to stay, it should decide to do so fully this time and not be allowed to opt out of various aspects.

Written Answers are published on the Oireachtas website.
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