Sinn Féin leader in the Seanad, Senator Conor Murphy, has said that the Irish government must embrace this time of pivotal change and opportunity with open arms, hearts and minds, and take a more proactive role in the planning and preparation for constitutional change.
Speaking today at the Institute of International and European Affairs, Senator Murphy said that the Irish Government is not only best placed, but is duty bound given its responsibilities under the Good Friday Agreement to lead this planning and preparation phase which we are now entering. He called for a Citizens’ Assembly to be established to encourage greater participation by populations across the island in deciding their future, adding that respect and cooperation must be the cornerstone on which a new Ireland is built.
Senator Murphy’s speech in full: ‘A New Ireland – A Time of Opportunity’
For the people of Ireland, in the last thirty years, two years stand out more than most – 1998 and 2016.
They do so for very different reasons – 1998 was the year the people of Ireland voted to endorse the Good Friday Agreement (GFA) and 2016 was the year the people of the North of Ireland voted to remain inside the EU and reject Brexit – yet the British government ignored the democratic will of the people of the North and forcibly removed the North of Ireland from the EU, in January 2020.
In both referenda large numbers of the unionist and Protestant population voted in favour of the GFA and against Brexit.
This demonstrated that they are interested in being part of a wider set of relationships across Ireland and the EU.
The GFA promised and delivered unprecedented and positive change within Ireland, between Ireland and Britain and between Ireland and the EU.
Brexit promised and delivered chaos in Britain and risked damaging the peace process here.
The combined pressure of the United States administration and the EU ensured that the damage to the peace process and to the economies of Ireland was contained, the message eventually getting through to the British government that Ireland was a special case and should not be press-ganged into a hard-Brexit regime.
