Government backing for Scotland staying in EU only fair – Martin

Ireland should demand fair play for Scotland if it seeks to remain in the EU, Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin has said.

He told the Dáil, during the day-long debate on the UK’s decision to leave the EU, that “it would be unacceptable for Scotland to be treated as a normal candidate country should it seek to remain as a member of the EU”.

He said Scotland implements all EU laws and would not need to be reviewed for its standards of governance and ability to implement such laws. “It has a strong administration, a distinct legal system and an absolute commitment to European ideals,” he said.

“Scotland is strong enough to advocate for itself, but Ireland should be its friend and demand fair play should it seek to remain in the EU,” he said.

Mr Martin said, however, that on the issue of whether Scotland could effectively veto a Brexit "we have to play this straight leaving this to the administrations concerned. Europe must under no circumstance interfere."

He described the referendum result as the final outcome of four decades of rhetoric “which blamed Europe and foreigners for everything. It followed an incoherent and pointless period of negotiations focused on marginal issues.”

Mr Martin warned that Ireland had to take different route. “We do not have their nostalgia for empire or fear of outsiders.”

He said to be successful, to offer a future for our people and to have a voice in the world we must be active members of the European Union.

The Fianna Fáil leader said the need for a determined political response could not be stronger.

“We must be clear on Ireland’s fundamental policy towards Europe. We must develop a new framework for relations with the UK. We must prepare for new threats and possible opportunities.”

He added that “most of all we must take a stand against the ideologies which were central to this result and which are a real and rising threat to shared democracy, human rights and development in Europe”.

The Cork TD stressed there was a mandate for the United Kingdom to leave the EU “but for nothing else. No one, especially those who pushed for this result, knows what comes next.”

He said “they have not even made up their mind when they want to trigger the process of negotiating departure. The political firestorm of an empowered far right and far left in Europe may be contained or it may lead to a period of growing extremism and xenophobia.”

Fiscal rules

Hitting out at those who said the vote was against austerity politics, Mr Martin said “the UK is not in the euro [zone], is not subject to its fiscal rules and has been master of its own economic destiny in recent years”.

There was anger in many English communities about insecurity and living standards, “but it is the Westminster government which sets the core fiscal and economic policies of the UK”.

Mr Martin said “it is those who want to end most workers’ rights, gut consumer protection, oppose environmental protection and deny climate change that ran and funded the Leave campaign”.

He also criticised those who claimed it was a backlash against “so-called European warmongering”.

Sinn Féin leader Gerry Adams repeated his call for a referendum on Irish unity.

He said the Irish Government must work to promote the interests of the whole of Ireland and the North in particular in future talks at an EU level. It must also support the rights of ministers in the North to deal directly with the EU institutions.

“This can be achieved by the maximum co-operation between the executive and the Government in Dublin upholding the vote of the electorate in the North,” he added.

Mr Adams said the DUP must also respect the Remain vote. “The majority of citizens in the North, including many unionists, rejected its exit policy,” he added. “The DUP must accept this.”

He said Sinn Féin and other progressives campaigned against membership of the EEC in 1972.

“Over the decades since then we have modified our position to one of critical engagement,” he added. “This position was formally adopted by our ardfheis in 1999.”

Labour leader Brendan Howlin recalled he had said on Friday the vote of the British people was a tragedy. “That seems no less a tragedy to me today,” he said.

He said the EU had served as an arena where the relationships between the Republic and its sister islands had improved immeasurably.

He said the EU had allowed the Republic, for the first time in its history, to address and deal with the UK as an equal and not as a former colonial master.

“And it has also afforded the UK the opportunity to see a former colony as a true friend,” he added.

Mr Howlin said the Republic wanted its trading relationship with the UK, including Northern Ireland, not only to survive, as it had done, but to grow and to thrive further.

He said there seemed now to be emergency on the part of some EU countries to proceed with the exit process immediately. He would urge caution, he added, given the Republic was the EU member state with most at stake.