 Chiewwy roi unrhyw gynnig! It's an interesting time not only the selection of this particular day which seemed to be in a long way coming and I suppose most of us would regard as a very sad day a day that we could have avoided and it's also obviously the teeth of an election campaign I have achieved actually this minute something that I have been trying to achieve for the last 3 weeks and that is by location because I am doing an interview on Shawnaw Rock right now yn ymwyng yw'r wyf, ond ddŵr'r ffordd y gallu gwneud yn ffyrdd i'w. ac sgwrdd am ychydig iddyn nhw i'r dewis yw nerod y mae'r gwaith am unigol ar y barfod o'r stampingau bach nhw, ac mae'nruckio i ni'r gwneud. Fe yw'r gemhreithio, mae'n Michol ei gydw i'r bleddiant o'r myfyrdd i'w yng Nghyry Paeth. Mae'r unrhyw'r bethau i'w brydoleth hynny i'w bryddoedd. There are many familial and economic ties between these two islands. That led to the common travel area being established after Irish independence, which facilitated the free movement of peoples between these islands to continue and also ensured that Ireland and Britain largely share a unified labour market. We had free movement of people long before the creation of the European single market. I'm glad that both the Irish and British governments signed a new memorandum of understanding in May of last year to preserve the common travel area post Brexit, including the rights of Irish and British citizens in each of our jurisdictions. Most people felt, well, that was extant anyway and wasn't under threat, but there was a concern in the fractiousness of a disorderly exit that might have been under threat and it was a very important achievement to actually codify for the first time what was a bilateral agreement. Ireland's economic model remains closely aligned to that of the United Kingdom. Axis to the British labour market has been a safety valve for Irish unemployment for decades, obviously searingly so in the early decades of our state. And the tradition of taking the boat has perhaps given birth to the culture where Irish people today take the plane to Australia or America to work and to gain life experience. For many years workers were tempted to the British side of the pond, the British side of our shared labour market by the lure of higher wages or greater work experience. Only more recently has this trend reversed in favour of migrant workers coming to Ireland for jobs at high levels of our economy. Not only wages but also income tax and VAT have tended to be reasonably closely aligned between the United Kingdom and Ireland. Cross-border trade is part of that equation. But also levels of personal taxation in Britain tended over the decades to be the benchmark used to determine whether Ireland's tax system is competitive. I believe that has been very unhelpful. Not least it leads to facile comparisons between headline tax rates, ignoring effective tax rates that people actually pay and ignoring the many different tax credits and tax breaks that are different in each of our systems. This is just one example of many showing how Irish public policy has been hugely influenced by the public policy dominant in the United Kingdom. And now the UK is leaving. Ireland is remaining within the European Union. In addition to all the economic risks for Ireland, there is also an opportunity now to imagine a new direction for Ireland that is less focused on our close historical relationship with Britain. Ireland now has two distinct goals. Firstly, we want to retain a close relationship with the United Kingdom, of course we do. And to facilitate this, we want the UK to have a close relationship with the markets and structures of the European Union. And secondly, we want Ireland to remain close to Europe and we want to seize the opportunity now available to develop our country in the way that other small open trading countries within the European Union have done, countries like Denmark and Finland to name but two. They enjoy a higher level of quality of life, of social well-being and they have built economic models and public services that have provided a large level of equality. It may not be possible to achieve both of these goals and a serious question therefore arises for Ireland, even in this election and that is in which of these goals is more important for Ireland and her people right now. From a Labour Party perspective, we will work to achieve both. We will continue to insist on an open Irish border in any event as we have done from the start of the disentanglement process. We will work with our friends in the UK Labour Party and in the UK Labour movement, people that were in constant contact with in the TUC, like their General Secretary Francis O'Grady, to push for a close UK-EU partnership with no barriers to trade. But the prospects of a close partnership between the UK and the EU are currently very uncertain. Boris Johnson has made it clear that his government doesn't want to be closely aligned to the European standards including protections for workers and the environment. So if push comes to shove, Labour's preference will lie with a closer relationship with the European Union over one with Britain. It is not at all clear if this view is shared with Fenefal and Finnegale. The manifesto tax plans that are now being put before the Irish people of Finnegale would cut public spending by 8.6 billion euros over the next five years. And their income tax plans in particular would change income inequality, worship it in Ireland and make it more distant from the emerging patterns within the European Union. We, if those particular plans were implemented, would actually be among the most unequal distribution of tax and wealth in the European Union, moving Ireland much closer to the British model. It would represent a significant change, which would undermine in my judgment the tax and welfare system that has taken many years to develop and worsen, as I say, the inequality between high and low income earners in our market. The OECD and the ISRI have repeatedly shown that baseline income is grossly unequal in Ireland. What brings us to the European norms is the state intervention through taxation and social welfare. And if those two mechanisms, the actions of the state move closer to Britain, then that inequality will worsen. It would bring Ireland however closer in line with the UK in terms of inequality. It would also lower government spending in Ireland to well below what is typical in North European or West European countries. If you look at Fina Foll's plan to cut public spending by 5.6 billion in terms of available tax revenue, it's less severe, but the direction of travel is still the same. They too will drag us towards a lower tax, smaller government model favoured by British Conservatives. And their cuts to capital gains tax will obviously worsen income and wealth inequality. So both Fina Foll and Fina Gael have repeatedly compared Ireland's income tax rates to the United Kingdoms rather than comparing our public services to those provided in the Denmark and the Finland of Europe. That says a lot about their contemplation of the direction of travel of our country. So we may have arrived at a point at which the cross-party support for government policy on Brexit will end. Labour will not support any government that seeks to distance Ireland from European norms to remain closer to British economic policy. This election marks the point where cross-party unity over Brexit policy has been contaminated by party political difference. Fina Gael have mixed up the state's European policy with their own election politics. They've used meetings with European officials as part of the election campaign. Ireland's EU commissioner, nominally non-partisan, has made clearly political interventions to favour the government party by talking up the threat of Brexit at this critical time. As a matter of fact, the threat of a hard Brexit shows the weakness of what Fina Gael ultimately achieved. Far from ensuring a bulletproof cast-iron settlement of Ireland's real and genuine concerns, we now have a vulnerability to a capricious and mendacious Boris Johnson's politics who has legislated to rule out any extension of talks beyond the end of this year and who is hostile to any level playing field of rights and standards between his country and the European Union. At best, we are likely to seek a minimal trade deal in goods which will do serious harm to the economy. We may even see the UK engaging in attempts to undermine its neighbours by lowering its work standards or environmental standards. A hard Brexit, therefore, is still a real prospect at the end of this year. This is a challenging vista, but there is no reason to believe that Fina Gael would be any more successful than any other political party who understand these challenges in pursuing and protecting Ireland's interests. Any future government would have our exemplary diplomatic corps and public service to a system to support from across Europe, for Ireland, across all shades of political opinion. From all our social democratic, liberal and conservative parties, they will remain robustly loyal to our position, regardless of who enters government here. So Labour's vision is clear. We want Ireland to become more like the other small open trading economies of Europe. We want a decisive shift in public policy away from the tax giveaways of the Anglo-Saxon politics of the United Kingdom pursued by Boris Johnson and Trump's USA and towards the solidarity and collective investment in public services that has been long the hallmark of North European social democracy. Labour wants to see the development of collective bargaining rights for all workers and a restoration of national dialogue on major economic policies, including on climate change and on investment in infrastructure. We want higher in-work training and education, higher productivity and higher wages. We want to achieve free of charge healthcare and education, good quality public transport and well-planned communities and affordable public housing. We want strong ambition on climate and a vision for a clean green economy. All of this we believe is possible alongside innovation and entrepreneurialism. Following the example of other countries, we can go a long way towards eliminating long-term homelessness and child poverty in this country. And the route to a more European Ireland in the aftermath of Brexit would be blocked by any reckless undermining of our tax system. So we are truly at a crossroads. Britain under Boris Johnson has set its course to be a Trump-like, deregulated, socially unjust society. Europe without Britain will evolve. I believe in a much more social democratic fashion with strong public services. So we have a choice of what we want for Ireland's future. Our vision is crystal clear. We will wholeheartedly embrace the inclusive and socially just North European model. We want a well-regulated economy that provides access to essential services and real opportunities for all. Ireland's perennial dilemma of keeping a leg in both the British economy and in the continental European economy is no longer sustainable. This election will set Ireland's direction of travel. The choice of closer to Brexit Britain or closer to evolving Europe is not only important, it will have very long-standing consequences. Thank you very much indeed. But in the meantime we'd like to take questions from the floor, to the subject matter of international European affairs and the subject matter that Brendan addressed there. So I'm going to take questions and we'll do them one by one. Unless we get too many, then we'll group them. But otherwise we'll start, please, on the right. Thank you very much, Francis Jacobs. Thank you very much for a very interesting speech. And I really noted your support for the Nordic model of Denmark, Finland and so on. One of the big choices both that the European Union is now facing is, of course, on its longer-term budget. And there's been this chivalry for the 1% budget. And yet if you want to do so many things of solidarity and strengthen the European Union, you need a bigger budget. And yet the Nordic countries you admire are among the big supporters of just sticking to the existing budget. Yesterday at the similar meeting, Miol Martin, without saying how much, said that he supported a larger European Union budget. Where do you stand on that? It's a very fair question. And I have to tell you I have very first-hand knowledge of those very views because I attend the PES leaders' groupings with Prime Ministers and leaders from countries like Denmark and Sweden that you would imagine would be pushing for a broadening of social solidarity in that sense. And in truth, they are responding to pressures from their own internal constituencies. And there is a reluctance to push for a greater European budget. I think there is a need for one. I think Europe, it needs at its heart to be able to fund its social direction. And I would be in favour of that. And I've argued that within the confines of our socialist leaders group. I was involved in the last multi-annual financial framework negotiations. And there's always a reluctance to even acknowledge that you're pushing for more money for Europe. Because we've allowed it to be contaminated. And that's particularly true, obviously no longer will be true with Britain. For example, I insisted on continuing the PES-4 funding and money for interreg. And I had discussions with the Cabinet Office in Britain during the last multi-annual financial framework discussions. And I finally got to a position because obviously I wanted a joint presentation from Ireland and Britain to the Commission to continue to fund these. The final position was, the British would not object to me making the submission. But they wouldn't overtly support it. But they would sort of vote to support it. Because they couldn't politically accept the notion that they were actually advocating for an increase of spending anywhere that was settled policy. So I think we have to be brave. We have to set out a vision for Europe now. And really the weight of Brexit for the last three years has just, I think, ground us down. And in a way we should break free of that now and envisage what Europe will be like. And hopefully funded and dynamic in a way that a future British Government and a future British electorate will want to rejoin. Hello, good morning. My name is Suzanne Keating. I'm the CEO of DOCUS, the platform of international NGOs. I know for many of us yesterday is probably the day the week around Brexit. But this week was also the 74th anniversary of Auschwitz, the liberation of Auschwitz. And so it reminded us of the very ideals of the European Union and it's very much around that. It's rolled around global peace and conflict. So I'm interested to hear what your perspective is around the European Union's approach right now on migration and refugees. Will and be playing a stronger, a more progressive role and kind of more broadly around external action. So much of the conversation that the European Union at the moment is about Europe, not about its role in the bigger world, if you like, particularly around poverty, reduction and global peace. So again, interested to hear what will you be fighting for, what would be calling for in terms of Europe's direction. Thank you. There's a number of strands to your question obviously. The question is a stand-alone moral question that weighs on us all. We've made lots of speeches in the door in relation to it, almost saying we can be moral because it doesn't affect us very much and something should be done, less in embracing the solution ourselves. Labour has always advocated for taking our responsibilities seriously. We, for example, opposed the change of the constitution some years ago that denied Irish citizenship to people born here in certain circumstances. That was a very minority position and I think probably like 80% of the population voted for it. But I think we need to be clear in what we want to do. Again, that dilemma, as I said, my most immediate interaction with European leaders is at the European PES leaders meetings. And there is a dichotomy there too. If you hear people like Prime Minister Costa or Sanchez of Spain, they're very strong and passionate advocates for integration and acceptance. But even some of the Nordics now, seared by their own political experience, are more reluctant to do that. I think again it's an area where we have to set out an agreed moral position. One that we can bring our people with us. We have been lucky in this polity, in our politics here, by and large that we haven't had a huge contamination of racist rhetoric or populism. Some would argue that that has begun to be undermined in recent times. But we'll see how that pans out. I can test it close to home, that's all I'd say. A question from the back. Thank you, Deputy Highland, and thanks again to the IIEF for hosting these very important series of discussions with party leaders. My name is Selena Donnelly and I work with Trocra. I was glad to hear you give priority to the urgent need for action on climate and biodiversity crisis that we're facing globally. My question is, if taking part in the next government, will you commit to push that Ireland immediately joins the group of EU member states that are calling for an increase in the EU's 2030 climate targets to at least 55% aiming for 65% reductions in line with the latest findings of the intergovernmental panel on climate change and then also work to deliver an 8% a year annual reduction in emissions in the lifetime of the next government. Thank you. We're very good in this country of setting targets and publishing policy platforms. Our normal difficulty is actually achieving them. We've set out within the arachtas to try and overcome that in a structured way and that's why we had an all-party plan. Sean Sherlock worked for us in relation to that. We brought in the experts to see what we could actually achieve with great ambition and determination. We've embraced that as our party political strategy. It is very ambitious. It is to have greenhouse gas emissions by 2030. That's going to be extraordinary difficult to bring it from 60 million tonnes to 30 million tonnes over that period. It has to go across all sectors of the economy with hard questions to be answered. But like all public platforms in this country, we've had the all-party discussions with experts giving very clear testimony of what needed to be done. Everybody signed up to it except at the very end when there was some hard policy choices that just might be unpopular and people started resiling from that then. If we believe, as I do, and my party does, that climate change is a quintessential challenge to humanity on the planet, then we must step up to the plate, and that means changing fundamentally the way that we do things. The final sentence I'll say on this is I think actually labour movements and labour parties are uniquely equipped to actually address those because most of the elements in terms of the changes that we have to make are related to work and to the labour movement, in transport, in work itself, in energy generation, in agriculture, and we need to make those fundamental changes in a just way. So that's why, for example, we support the carbon tax, the increase in the carbon tax that's set out in the plan, and also we support the ring fencing of that for a just transition because I have gone to communities in the Midlands who are going to lose the traditional work there, but we have to set out a different version of how they can be employed in rewetting the bogs, recreating biodiversity, in recreating green energy through wind and so on, and in a massive programme of retrofit. But that could be a colossal investment, so we can't pretend we can do that without having the taxes. Thank you very much. Stefan Kroesaf, French Ambassador. I have two questions, in fact. One is on corporate taxation. Do you think it's at the right level? Do you think the OECD should there not be an agreement at OECD? It will go back to the European Union discussions and what would be your position in that respect. And the second question is more general. It's regarding the future conference on the future of Europe which might be launched as early as the 9th of May where there will be discussions about where we want the EU to go among all the citizens. What would be your proposals for that conference on the future of Europe? Two very broad-ranging questions. In terms of cooperation tax, our position is very clear. We support the existing 12.5% co-operation tax that exists in Ireland but we want it to be an effective rate of co-operation tax which it isn't for many co-operations. We want a permanent commission on taxation to ensure that as tax avoidance measures are discovered that we close them. I worked in my time in government with the OECD in relation to the base erosion and profit shifting process, the BEPS process. I'm very strongly of the view that you can't unilaterally alter the co-operation tax because co-operations are global. Intellectual property is extraordinary global and it can cite itself wherever. So we need to have an international agreed structure for it. And I think great progress has been made. We in government ended some of the anomalies that had been created here including the double Irish and we want to have a transparent and fair taxation system. When you drill down and you talk to any of the colleagues, often in countries including I have to say in your own in France what you see is not what you'd necessarily get when you look at the actual treatment of co-operations on a regional basis, hidden subsidies and so on. So we need to have complete transparency in relation to taxation and we need to ensure from a moral perspective that co-operations pay their fair share and in Ireland that is an effective tax rate of 12.5% and hopefully that we can have international norms established that are enforceable. We've begun the process by at least having transparency in what they're paying and Ireland has signed up to that. In terms of the future of Europe, I hope I've set out a vision of what I see Ireland's perspective on that. I think I'd love to see a model of a social Europe where the principles of European solidarity, of equality are embedded. There are real challenges to that and I suppose one of the dilemmas of the last couple of years when we had debates in the door is the overarching challenge of Brexit has diverted our view from shaping what we want for Europe. I know Helen McIntee has done a fair deal of work on that and we've had some debates on it but obviously my vision that we would work within the socialist group is to have a social Europe where people have aspirations to equality, mobility and fulfilling their own potential. That you have quality public services like health and education free at the point of delivery and that we have fair taxation that affects everybody across the union. Thanks very much, Chair. Blair Horan, Member of the Institute. Thanks very much, Brendan, for your presentation and I would absolutely agree with your viewpoint that now we have to move closer to the European social market model. I hope I'm wrong but I think it may still take us time to wean ourselves away from the Anglo-Saxon model. And as we do, I'm not convinced that the idea of social Europe important though it is in terms of citizens' attachment to Europe I'm not so sure that in itself is enough to secure the future of the European Union in this sense. I'm not worried about Brexit undermining the EU since the Schumann Declaration the UK has always had a problem with pooling sovereignty. I'm more worried about the likes of Salvini and Marine Le Pen and what impact that can have in the future and I feel that the concept of European identity is very important in terms of not to replace national identity but to sit alongside it. Things like EU citizens in Ireland being able to have similar voting rights like we have in bilateral races with the UK and issues like that that's important in the future in terms of a greater sense of European identity and I'm just wondering of your view on that not to replace national identity but to sit alongside it. I'm not as sanguine in my view in relation to our own future I think this actual election is a very important first step in determining which direction we take I don't think it's necessarily the fact that we're going to embrace Europe I think that the policy platform certainly a Ffina Folland-Finnigale and to a great extension, Sinn Fein too is playing to the European Union and the European Union Ffina Folland-Finn too is playing to the old notion that we can have low taxes and yet manage to have decent public services and it's a con job in my judgement I try to explain that to people having tried to mine the money for five years I have some experience of that you can only spend each euro once you can promise it twice but you can only spend it once and I think that we need to have some reality about that so if that is going to be the platform we present into the future we're going to have difficulties and I think that we need to argue and fight for that from my perspective I agree with your concerns about growing nationalism and growing populism in Europe it's beginning to manifest itself in very very narrow slivers here but it hasn't gained any popular traction but it is a real threat but the way to overcome that is the disease is the same as brought on Brexit in the north of England I canvassed against Brexit in Lancashire and in working class areas where there was massive labour votes for labour at that stage for labour MPs but overwhelming votes for exit because this was the devil incarnate decisions were made in Brussels and the same with Trump the rust belt heartlands of the democratic party we need to have a different vision for them to wind them off this notion of populism being the answer because it clearly isn't but that means real sense of solidarity real investment, real regionalisation we just start to hear in our country as well so that we don't suck everything into Dublin that we do have proper regional policies that are actually properly invested in so I think we can create an exciting vision of an alternative Europe that people will rally to against the tiredness of feeling neglected that has happened over the last while and can I say maybe very partisanly the dominance of the Conservative parties in Europe over the last ten years has weakened the vision of dynamic future for Europe if you look back to the years when socialists were in charge they were strident in their vision of an integrated prosperous free Europe that has died to death to some degree and we need to revive that Unod, do I remember of the institute? Thank you indeed for setting out your clear vision of Ireland's vision for Ireland's future in Europe and indeed for Europe's future direction following a little bit on Blair's question and I've asked the same question to the t-shirt or similar question as earlier today How do you propose to ensure that these visions and this progress is underpinned by a proper communication of Europe to its peoples not just at the Irish level but also throughout Europe and indeed how could we possibly get their necessary support for an increase in the budget if it is not properly communicated to them and indeed they're not connected in some way with it Thank you I think you're asking an extremely profound question and I don't have an answer for it We spent a lot of our time scratching our head how to communicate the door to populations I mean the RTE regards that there's something put on a 10 pass midnight Pat Rabbit described it as for alcoholics and insomniacs Connecting now, I know I'm not a politician of the social media age but even two years ago when I used to do videos 30 seconds I was told I have to give my message in 30 seconds Now I'm told if I don't give it in 8 seconds I've lost it So it's very hard to communicate on that basis but we do need to I think people are interested in politics in Ireland they're interested in just to be relevant to themselves and there is a distancing I don't know how we haven't constructed it yet but we do need I know after some referendum we had great thoughts for example at least now we have debates pre-council in the Dall and we post-council in the Dall Who reads it? Who listens to it? I don't know I think we just need to do an awful lot more thinking unfortunately I just don't have an answer to that question but everybody is focused on so many different things I think if we give people a sense of Europe that is positive by delivering for them then they might be interested in the institutions and make it more democratic Sure Just to bring us back to our nearest neighbour at the UK I'm just reading a tweet from a former colleague of mine that said this morning that ever since the Anglo-Normans arrived here 850 years ago Ireland and Britain have moved in step for good are real when independent we joined the EU together today we're going our separate ways by any measured days and historic day and the great Brexit experiment has begun I suppose we have moved obviously in last step within the European Union as well how are we going to fill this gap in the relationship now because we're not going to be at the table with men in Brussels we have obviously got the structure of the Good Friday Agreement but what else do we need to do to ensure that the relationship is protected and built is a really really important question I think my crowd came over with the Anglo-Normans because they came to Wexford first as you know landed in Bagunbon the Howlins were part of Strongbow's gang and it moved very much beyond Wexford they obviously decided that the sea journey was enough and most of the Howlins are still there but in terms of we need to have a different relationship with Britain we've had now the opportunity of often monthly meetings with ministers bilaterally after European Council meetings very regular meetings we still will have obviously the Good Friday Institution thankfully back re-instituted now so we'll have North-South Dialogue and we'll have Council of the Isle Dialogue but we do need to have I'd love to see a much more structured like the Nordic countries co-operate in a much more structured way between Britain and Ireland to have regular interaction and that's the next phase of our discussion, how we structure that we could learn I think from our Nordic country colleagues to have proper dialogue on everything we do together I think the model we have for the North-South Ministerials where ministers meet every six months and where the full Cabinet meets annually is not a bad model for Britain and Ireland as well that's the sort of thing we do interact obviously on a parliamentary basis and with the regional parliament in the United Kingdom as well and I think even more social and cultural interaction is an important part of that too we're going to draw this event this third in our series to a close I want to thank everybody for being here I want to thank Brendan Howland in particular for being my locational