Brendan Smith Urges More Education and Cross-Border Conversations

Thanks very much, Niamh. Well, I think anybody listening to Roisin or yourself, Niamh, would be very clear in their hearing that you're very complimentary of the achievement of the Good Friday Agreement. You said a fabulous achievement, a massive achievement. I think all of us around this table would agree with that and compliments to the people who made it possible. And it's up to all of us to ensure that it's implemented in full. I've often used the phrase, we have not maximised the potential of the agreement. No. There's so much more to be done by all of us on this island and by Irish and British governments, and that will happen for some time into the future as well. Could I just say you talked about conversations that are so important. I think Senator Neil Blaney reflected the same thought on that particular subject. Could I just say that we're short quite a number of members here today, and I understand some of our colleagues are attending a non-Ireland event, cross-border event in Enniskillen, and I think it's a shared island event, and it's particularly focused on women's issues as far as I know. And I know that one of my colleagues, Senator Erin McGreehan, spoke to me. She couldn't make it here today because she was attending that important event in Enniskillen. When I mentioned shared island, shared island is facilitating conversations at sectoral level, be it in relation to tourism, be it in relation to different aspects of our everyday living. I think that's important that we have those conversations at different levels, be it the community and voluntary sector, be it the people in tourism, hospitality, people in agriculture, people in different sport, and there are so many issues that are important that we can address on an all-Ireland basis that I would like to see. And I think those conversations at sectoral level are very important. I think that they will get to the number of problems much quicker and maybe to a greater significance than an assembly with every subject matter just before a citizen assembly. So I think conversations at micro level as well as the macro level are important. You mentioned with the Peace Education Programme, and I see some of your programmes have been funded by the Peace 4 Programme. The Minister for Public Expenditure, Deputy Michael McGrath, in response to questions I had recently stated that the new Peace Plus Programme, hopefully it would be formally signed off by Europe in the not too distant future. And I think it's the desire of the Irish Government and the Northern Ireland Executive as well to have that programme up in place as soon as possible. And I hope that your project can benefit from the Peace Plus Programme. And maybe I'm sure I speak for the Committee here when we say that if we can support you in your request to the Peace Plus Programme, that we value the work that you do because you have been before this Committee on a number of occasions. Just with regard to the Peace Education Programme, I think if we don't succeed at education, if we don't succeed in ensuring that people have better attainments in education and all that, some of the issues that have bedevilled society will continue. And I believe, you know, we had an integrated education group here recently and they outlined towards the particular difficulties in lack of attainment at second, further education and third level as well. So we need improvement in that respect through the different strata in education. One of the programmes that I always thought was very beneficial and useful was the Wider Horizons programme. I don't know if you're familiar with it. It was our colleague here on the Rock, the Senator, Jeremy Wilson, as Youth Reach Coordinator in County Cabinet at the time. He had a number of youth training programmes going between groups here in this state and groups in Northern Ireland. And I'm just speaking, as Deputy Tully would know, for our own County Cabinet Vocational Education Committee at the time, our Youth Reach centres had collaboration with similar groups in Northern Ireland. There were youth training programmes and said that the groups from Northern Ireland, they came to their counterparts south of the border, engaged in some of the work and training and learning that they were doing. And similarly, groups from here travelled north. Part of that programme then involved travel abroad, the United States, Australia, particularly where there were Irish communities. And Roisin mentioned some of the schools, the university and that have particular focus on politics as it applies to our island. And they were involved in vocational programmes there. Now, I followed up because I attended many of their events over the years in my own constituency. And to my knowledge, a lot of the context that were made by those young people at that time have continued 20 years on. And I think that is very important. And we were dealing with predominantly the people who took part in those programmes were people who were in second chance education. Youth Reach is often populated by young people who left formal education, but now want to go back, follow a particular course. And in so many instances today, it's great to see those people have come back to second chance education. Then they go on to the further education sector. Many of them end up with their primary degrees and higher qualifications as well. So I would, that Wide Horizons programme doesn't exist nowadays. It's gone for a number of years. But it's that type of programme I think can be really, really beneficial, where you're targeting people at a particular age group. And I think we should build on the success of those programmes. You mentioned in your opening comment as well, hard to reach people. I think it's a very good phrase. Because it's often the people who don't engage with different groups, that they're left out there, maybe isolated, and maybe thinking that there's nobody out there to listen to them or to help them or to understand them. And you know, we all know that in our own communities at times, where thankfully in Ireland today, we have great senior citizens groups, where we have very active communities, where social activities are arranged pre-COVID and now resuming as well, resuming now hopefully for the future as well, where groups go in and meet on a social basis once a week or whatever. Now, oftentimes there's still a cohort who won't attend those groups. Maybe people living isolated, living very lonely lives, and it's just how you reach those people. You know, in every walk of life, there'll be that small cohort within each sector of society that won't be reached. So, again, I don't know how we devise a mechanism to get to those people that are hard to reach, but I think that there needs to be a particular focus, you know, in all our work on trying to reach those people. So, I commend you that you highlight that within the victims and survivors groups to try to reach. I raised that here with Minister Coveney one day that, you know, was his department satisfied that the families of victims, you know, that there was engagement with them at an official level? You know, in some instances, people haven't sought help or maybe they haven't been reached out to. So, it would be shocking and very disappointing if there are people out there who haven't been given support or maybe who haven't sought support and who don't benefit from whatever support schemes are in place. They don't want to think of the work of wave trauma and all other advocacy and support groups as well. Look, I attended, as other colleagues in this committee did, different Glencree events over the years, and I found them very beneficial. And the Chatham House rules, as you could go and talk, in 99% of the time you could talk your mind and you wouldn't be quoted. 99% of it anyway, at least, if not more. But I think it's a very good concept. I remember being at one of the first engagements you had in relation to Brexit. It was very informative. It was a time when people from different traditions were very concerned about what might emerge. But that work that all of our colleagues spoke about here today, your work in that regard, is very important because there are so many issues still to be dealt with, and we all know the legacy issues. We never need to take the emphasis away from supporting those people and trying to resolve those issues, and that's not simple, as we all know. So, again, I read out at the beginning quite a number of our colleagues who can't be here, who would like to be here with us today, and thank you for your excellent contributions, and I have no doubt that, as a committee, we would have been further engagement with you. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you.