THE Irish Government wants Britain to stay in the EU, its Foreign Affairs Minister said in a keynote address in Edinburgh tonight.
Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade Charlie Flanagan also highlighted the potential for increased trade with Scotland at a public lecture attended by over 150 people at the Europa Institute.
The event was held in association with the Irish Consulate and Edinburgh University, which outside of Ireland boasts the largest number of Irish historians at a research university worldwide.
Warning of the need for Britain to stay in the EU, Minister Flanagan said: "We in Ireland want the UK to remain firmly within the EU. The Taoiseach and I, and our colleagues in the Irish Government have been clear and upfront in expressing this position over the last number of months.
"I know that Scotland values EU membership and that it recognises its particular importance in the context of the Scottish-Irish relationship. Cabinet Secretary Hyslop made that point very candidly when she was in Dublin last week, and I am grateful to her for doing so.”
He added: “Like no other platform, like no other community, the EU amplifies our voice, our values, and our influence in the world.”
Minister Flanagan, who is in Scotland on his first official visit, is also meeting with Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon; Fiona Hyslop, Secretary for Culture, Europe and External Affairs and Secretary of State for Scotland Alistair Carmichael, as well as representatives from the Irish business, academic and cultural communities.
More than 250 indigenous Irish companies are currently exporting goods and services to Scotland, with two-way business valued at €1billion per week.
Scotland also accounts for almost 10 per cent of all visitors from Britain to Ireland.
“The UK is Ireland’s most important trade partner, with two-way business valued at €1 billion per week,” the Minister said. “Within the framework of the British-Irish relationship, our links with Scotland are particularly important.”
He added: “The level of business exchange between Ireland and Scotland is robust and growing. Irish companies such as AIB, Bank of Ireland, Glennon Brothers, Sisk, Roadbridge and many others are heavily engaged in generating business and jobs in Scotland.”
The Minister spoke of the potential synergy between the business sectors of Scotland and Ireland particularly in the fields of renewable energy, clean-tech, water and waste treatment, and other sustainable technologies.
He also announced that an additional diplomat will soon be assigned to the Irish Consulate in Edinburgh.
“With budgets still tight, allocation of Ireland’s resources must necessarily be directed toward relationships that we believe hold the greatest potential and Scotland hits that mark,” he said.
As part of the visit’s cultural programme Minister Flanagan is due to meet with the National Museum of Scotland and launch the Yeats2015 celebration.
In his speech the Minister spoke of some of Ireland’s historic connections to Scotland:
- The Book of Kells is probably Ireland’s most prized national heirloom - a stunning velum manuscript containing the four Gospels. The origin of the Book of Kells is generally attributed to the scriptorium of the monastery founded around 561 by St Colum Cille on Iona. The monks fled to Kells, Co. Meath following a Viking raid in 806. It is thought that the Book was produced in Iona and Kells. It is an artefact which exemplifies the beautifully interwoven cultural, intellectual, and human ties between our people across millennia.
- The Conestoga Wagon, representing the huge migration from Ulster to colonial America in the 18th century, with many of those 200,000 immigrants also having their roots in Scotland.
- The shirt worn by James Connolly during the Easter Uprising in 1916. Connolly, one of the signatories of the Proclamation of Independence in 1916, was born in Edinburgh just a stone’s throw away from here at Cowgate.
