 You're very welcome to this beautiful ballroom here in Ivy House this morning for the first Ireland and the Baltic aid working together for a secure, sustainable and digital Europe. This conference is jointly hosted by the Institute of International and European Affairs, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, and the eight ambassadors of the Nordic Baltic countries accredited to Ireland. The conference is part of the IAEA future of the EU 27 project which is supported by the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and on behalf of the organisers I'd like to thank you all for joining us here this morning. My name is Yvonne Hulwon, I'll be moderating the events today and I hope you enjoy and can engage with the very interesting schedule that we have for you. To borrow a phrase from Antonis's welcome note in your booklet, Níniaart co-cur Lekele, in Irish means that working together makes us all stronger and hopefully today there'll be plenty of discussion and food for thought to bring home and how we can work better together on issues of security, sustainability and digital transformation. At a time of so much global uncertainty, partnerships and cooperation among like-minded countries are needed now more than ever and as I said I think we're going to have very interesting discussions on that theme today. Before we begin I'd like to have a few housekeeping items, I'd like to remind you to switch your phones to silent but please feel free to share your engagements here today online with the hashtag IRENB8 which is on the screen that you can see there. The entire address will be filmed and recorded so please note that all the contributions and questions are on the record, our fire exits are behind the screen or the door that you came in and the bathroom facilities are on the stairwell or below the stairwell on your way in. Now it's my great pleasure to invite Minister Richard Bruton who is the Minister for Communications Climate Action and Environment to officially open the event today so please welcome Minister Richard Bruton. Thanks very much Evin and it is a pleasure to be here I mean to bring nine countries together is something tremendous but to bring nine countries together to discuss the topics that you're discussing is really something special and I'd like to recognize my predecessor Alex White, I don't know where he was there a minute ago, I don't know where he's gone to, he's over on the far left, he's not really on the far left, no but this job that I have taken on whether it be one occupant between Alex and myself but it is an extraordinary range of responsibilities, I have responsibility for climate action, I have responsibility for the National Broadband Plan which Alex launched which has the ambition to deliver high-speed broadband to every premises in the country, every home, every business, a very ambitious plan, obviously a responsibility of public service broadcasting, one which is coming under pressure from the sort of digital revolution that we're seeing, digital safety which is becoming one of the huge topics of our day and the circular economy as they said how do we manage waste and protect our environment at a time of such massive change so I think the topic that you're taking on how do we shape a secure and sustainable and I think I would add a democratic future with citizen rights and citizens welfare at its core, it really is the challenge of our time and it's very fitting that I think country should come together to discuss this because it is not an issue, none of these issues are ones that we can resolve acting alone, if you think of the accumulation of greenhouse gases in our atmosphere which is now approaching an irreversible tipping point, we all know the implications of that, we know what we must do but we also know that we have to ensure that other nations come with us in taking on those challenges and that really does require international thinking on a scale that you know even still with all our efforts at the UN and so on we haven't mastered. We're seeing the revolution in digital technology, cloud, mobile, big data, social, internet of things, artificial intelligence, they are truly transforming every element of human interaction in ways that we simply can't predict often, can't fully understand and in ways that don't always respect the position of the citizen and their welfare and their rights and we're creating new monopolies of huge power, new institutions of extraordinary influence and much of that influence is wielded through software programs that we scarce understand what rules or principles are underpinning them. We're seeking to protect our core institutions in the face of this massive change and as I mentioned public service broadcasting is one, we really need an open forum where citizens can deliberate on the issues of the day, sifting evidence, understanding different points of view but instead I suppose we're seeing changes where increasingly you see people living in their own capsule, their own echo chamber where they only really hear the opinions of those that they already agree with and that is not the basis on which we can build a sustainable democracy. Equally as I say the software principles that underpin increasing decisions that will be made as automation takes hold, we don't understand often what are the basis of the decisions we make as we sift through job applications, through a machine or sift through insurance claims by machine, we don't have the same understanding of what principles of justice and fairness are underpinning those decisions that are being made. So there are lots of challenges out there and yet this is the most extraordinary time to live, the most extraordinary opportunities are being offered to people to participate in ways even no matter how remote you are to participate fully in society, to learn in different ways, to move away from the rote learning, to have genuine exploratory learning is hugely enabled by the technologies. We can restore our natural world, reignite biodiversity if we can overcome these challenges. But also we work under this extraordinary pace of change where as I say, voters unfortunately seem to be moving into capsules which make it hard to explain complex decision making processes that face us. And we have a younger generation who rightly are pointing the finger at us and saying you're the generation who's going to pass on this world in a worse state. You're the first generation that would pass on this world in a worse state than you found it. So I think for those of us and I think it probably covers most of the people in this room who believe in international sharing of sovereignty is the only way to overcome these problems and to balance the complex rights and responsibilities that are involved in all this massive change. This is an extraordinary opportunity. I think it's an extraordinary opportunity for those of us who believe in the concept of a European Union to reignite belief and vision for our European Union that's still reeling from the scars of austerity and how that has impacted on voter perception of this project. This is a huge opportunity if we can manage citizen welfare in the face of digital change, if we can manage citizen welfare in the face of climate change, we will have done something really extraordinary and we will put Europe back into a position where I think citizens will look up to the concept of sharing sovereignty in order to achieve more together than we can ever achieve on our own. I suppose for a small country like Ireland, we recognise that. We recognise that small countries don't wield influence unless we work together. So just to say how important meetings like this are, particularly important for a country like ours in a situation where Britain is leaving the European Union, I suppose they always say the urgent squeezes out the important and I suppose what's urgent in Irish politics today is undoubtedly how do we handle this decision. But what's important is what is Europe like after Britain is gone and how do we shape that and how do we shape the challenges that surround us. And today's conference goes to the heart of that question. So I'd like to wish you every success in your day. Great to be here in Ivy House, a beautiful place. If you get a chance, the weather won't smile on you, but Ivy Gardens is a gem right behind us here. Great place for a concert if you ever coming back to Dublin in the summer place to go and enjoy. So thanks very much for coming and I hope your day is very fruitful. Thank you.