Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent)

I am grateful for the opportunity to speak in this debate. It is vitally important that we have strong and meaningful engagements with every country in the world. I worked on behalf of a citizen of Clonmel and I want to thank the former Minister for Foreign Affairs, Deputy Coveney, and various Ministers, as well as the former Taoiseach, who helped out. The gentleman who was incarcerated there was from Clonmel. When he was incarcerated for so many years, his wife moved to Dublin. I was pleasantly informed, when I raised the matter here with the then Taoiseach, Deputy Varadkar, that his wife was a constituent of the Taoiseach's. The support that we got from the Department of Foreign Affairs was so important. I thank them for their engagement. That man went to hell and back because of a situation that was not of his own making. He worked for a Clonmel company. Unfortunately, like the crash here, there was a crash and he happened to be the paymaster, paying the bills. He was deemed to be responsible but there was no justice over there. There was no 90-day wait for money or whatever. He was incarcerated and deemed to be responsible for his company's inability to pay whomsoever. The support we got was so important. I want to thank the officials from the Department of Foreign Affairs and those working in our embassies around the world. I dealt with another case lately which turned out okay, thank God. A chap from my own constituency was missing in that part of the world as well but thankfully, he turned up safely. Again, the embassy stood ready to help.

On the day that is in it, with the indulgence of the Cathaoirleach Gníomhach, I wish to congratulate the President-elect of America. We must recognise the democracy out there. We must accept and work with whoever is the president of any country. The US was one of the first democracies. We have admired it for years. We saw all of the shenanigans in the last number of years but now that is the past. The people have spoken. Not only have the people spoken but I believe, although I have not been watching the coverage, the different states and electoral colleges have also spoken. There is a President-elect with a clear victory in all areas. I said to the Taoiseach earlier, when on my phone arrived a lovely picture that he decided to tweet of a baseball cap that arrived in his office, according to his own words, with "Harris" on it that he was electioneering for the candidate there. Not only that but in 2015 when he was a young Minister, he made a ferocious attack on Donald Trump. At that time, he was not President but he was aiming to be President. I refer to former President Trump, now President-elect. Deputy Harris said that any day in office is a good day when he has a different opinion and view to that of Donald Trump and Elon Musk. Mr. Musk has to be reined in, as we know. He is a private business man, as is former President Trump. We have to be very careful, as I said earlier. We have to praise the bridge as we go over. The Taoiseach made a recent statement again along the same lines. It was very ill-judged to be making comments when there was an election process going on over there. There is one starting here, when he gets the courage to blow the whistle, and we do not want interference from abroad. We have to work with all governments.

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